Playing the Game
by myshipsank
Summary: House has a game to play. His target is Cameron, but he's using Thirteen as a pawn in this game. There's no good way to play House's games, and there aren't many rules. May be slightly AU in terms of timeline.
1. Game Set

House had called Thirteen into his office, so naturally she followed him in and shut the door behind her, mentally preparing for some sort of idiocy.

"How many people on the team have you not slept with?" House asked, swinging his cane back and forth while sitting in his office chair. Thirteen rolled her eyes, wondering why he insisted on calling her in here to ask her such an asinine question.

"Wouldn't it be easier to ask how many I have slept with?" Thirteen responded with a question in return. House shrugged.

"That depends on how many there are. Which brings us back to my question," House said. Thirteen thought for a moment before replying.

"Just Foreman," she replied. House gave her an exaggerated shocked look.

"Just one? You've only slept with one of them? What, are they all not attractive for you?" House inquired with a mocking tone. Then again, his tone was always mocking. "Let's see… Chase is too much of a manwhore for you. You're in it for the conquest, and he presents no challenge. Then there's Wilson, but you see him as too moral. Kutner is not attractive enough for you, and Taub is… well, married. And that leaves Cameron," House went down the list, ticking off a finger for each name he mentioned.

"Cameron's so straight that she makes laser levels look crooked," Thirteen responded blandly.

"Oh, the woes of a hot bisexual doctor with an uncontrollable libido stuck on a team with people who are either not her type or too straight. It must be hard being you," House spoke dramatically. Thirteen took a controlled breath before saying anything that approached what had just come out of the sarcastic doctor's mouth.

"You treat people like mirrors. You look at them and see yourself," Thirteen observed. House mulled this over with overdone gestures.

"Let's see… hot bisexual doctor with an uncontrollable libido… you're right, Thirteen, the only difference between us is that you like dick as well as-"

"Is there anything else?" Thirteen cut him off, watching the conversation devolve rapidly.

"Back to what was said about Cameron… you said she'd straight as an arrow basically. So, I want you to make some sort of sexual joke about the two of you next time the team meet," House stated. Thirteen carefully raised one eyebrow. She wasn't quite sure where this was headed, but she was certain it wasn't anywhere good.

"And just why would I do that?" she asked the obvious. House gave her a toothy grin.

"I'll give you fifty bucks," House offered.

"Make it a hundred and you've got your day's entertainment," Thirteen countered. House smacked the desk with his cane.

"Deal," he responded. "And it better be good. I want to see her blushing after it!" House called after the brunette.

It was only about an hour later when the team next met to discuss a patient. Thirteen found herself distracted, as she kept looking over at Cameron and trying to work out how she was going to work in a comment that would satisfy House's demands.

"We can add hemorrhaging to the list. The patient started just now," Chase said.

"Maybe he picked up a sexually transmitted disease. Several of them are consistent with his symptoms," Kutner added. So now they were on the topic of sex. Perfect time to bring it in and earn an easy hundred dollars.

"I already tested the girlfriend. She came back clean," Chase refuted the theory.

"We should ask him without the girlfriend in the room if there's been anyone else. You know, that hot blonde coworker that you just can't keep your eyes off of who finally takes you up on an offer for drinks and then some. We've all been tempted," Thirteen interjected, staring right at Cameron as she spoke.

There was a heated silence in the room as everyone looked at Thirteen and then back at Cameron. Cameron's eyes held steady with Thirteen for a few seconds before the blonde looked down at her papers hastily with a faint blush on her cheeks at what the younger female doctor had just implied.

"Well then, Chase, you go interrogate the patient, and Kutner, I want you to distract the girlfriend. Give her some medical forms to fill out. The rest of you gents, I want you working on my clinic duties," House directed, breaking the tension like glass.

"What kind of forms?" Kutner asked.

"Oh, I don't care. Whatever's on the top of Cuddy's desk," House waved off the question. Chase and Kutner left, leaving Cameron and Thirteen alone with House. Cameron excused herself instantly, muttering something about getting a cup of coffee. Once she left, House started a slow clap.

"Congrats, you win a hundred dollars. I owe you tomorrow. I like what you did there, nice and subtle. But you managed to embarrass the straight doctor," House complimented. Thirteen felt a little empty; though she was receiving money and praise for her antics, she felt a twinge of regret. She didn't think that Cameron would react so strongly.

"Alright, you're good to go. Why don't you take an early lunch?" House suggested. Like he actually cared when she ate. As long as she showed up in time to help solve the puzzle, she knew House didn't actually give a damn if she ate at all or for two hours.

Nevertheless, Thirteen took House's suggestion, heading down to the cafeteria. When she entered, it was pretty empty since it wasn't even noon yet, but there was Cameron standing in line to order a cup of coffee. Thirteen walked over and stood behind her.

"Hey," she greeted the blonde. Cameron looked over at the other doctor in surprise.

"Oh, hey," she greeted without any enthusiasm. Thirteen cringed on the inside.

"You know, I'm sorry about what I said back there," Thirteen apologized. She knew that bringing up the topic, even in an apology, was bound to backfire, but she did it anyway. To her surprise, Cameron smiled.

"No big deal. Let me guess, a dare from House?" Cameron asked. Thirteen was amazed. She hadn't reacted in anger, and she's even guessed what the motivation had been.

"Yeah, a stupid one," Thirteen admitted. Cameron laughed.

"Aren't they always? I hope he's paying you for it," Cameron said. Thirteen found herself grinning along with Cameron.

"Yeah, and he actually told me to take a lunch break. I think he might have hit his head or something," Thirteen replied. She paused for a moment as Cameron ordered a coffee and then stepped up to order a simple sandwich. "Hey, do you want to sit down? God knows you need a bit of a break," Thirteen offered. Cameron shrugged.

"Why not?" she responded. The two women sat down on opposite sides of one of the booths. Thirteen took a moment to look at the woman in front of her. She may not have meant to embarrass Cameron, but that didn't mean that she hadn't meant what she said. Cameron was hot, and there was no way around it. That beautiful blonde hair combined with her stunning blue eyes, symmetrical features, and a fantastic body made for one very attractive woman.

"So, how did you know that House had put me up to it?" Thirteen inquired. Cameron took a sip of coffee and Thirteen took the opportunity of it being Cameron's turn to talk to take a bite of her sandwich.

"He's been poking at my sex life ever since I accidentally let slip about a one night stand I'd had a few weeks ago," Cameron admitted. Thirteen wondered what the guy had been like, what type Cameron had. Probably tall, dark, and handsome like most women.

"Well, he does the same for me, but it's usually just slipping in comments about me liking it both ways," the brunette agreed. She watched as the blonde took another drink of her coffee, lips curling around the rim of the cup. Thirteen found herself unwittingly licking her lips in response.

"He's a bastard," Cameron said. Thirteen cracked a smile.

"Of course he is," Thirteen affirmed. Cameron stood up.

"I'm sorry, but I've really got to get back to work. I should check on how the hemorrhaging patient is doing. Enjoy your lunch," Cameron said with an apologetic smile.

"Thanks," Thirteen responded. And a nice ass, Thirteen added to the list of attractive qualities she'd mentally been making earlier as she watched Cameron walking away. The brunette stared down at the rest of her sandwich, suddenly feeling lonely at an empty table and not really all that hungry. With a sigh, she got up, dumping her lunch in the trash and heading back up to work on the case.

On her way up, just as she was getting in the elevator, House came into view yelling for her to hold the door for him. She complied and waited for him to hobble into the metal box.

"Oh goodie, I was hoping I'd run into you," House said as the elevator door closed and they started their assent. "Now, since it was so much fun last time, I think you should make another uncomfortable situation for our little sexy blonde," House said. Thirteen shook her head.

"That's enough, House. I'm not playing your little game," she replied. House gave her his cranky look as if she'd just stolen his ice cream.

"Yes, and I'm not a cantankerous bastard. Of course you'll play," House mocked with much sarcasm. Thirteen controlled her emotions, like she always did around most people.

"No, I won't. If you want to see her embarrassed, just say something yourself," Thirteen argued calmly. The elevator dinged and the young doctor walked off without another word, leaving House to gape at her retreating form, surely already planning his revenge in some way. But she didn't care.

"Fine! I don't need you anyway!" House called out after her. Thirteen smirked; he sounded like a whining bitch. She left the office, knowing that this was far from over. House had a goal in mind, most likely a childish manipulation, but he would never let go of his ridiculous goals. Thirteen was ready to play his game, whatever it ended up being.


	2. Softening

"Good news, kiddies. We've got a man down the hall whose bones are breaking if you poke him," House announced. Foreman, Chase, Thirteen, Kutner, and Cameron all stared up at their boss.

"And this is good news… how?" Foreman asked. House threw a file at his face in place of any reply. He caught it and opened it to find that it was the patient's medical file. Before House finished handing out the files, Chase got an idea.

"How old is the patient? Brittle bones often come with old age," Chase said. House threw a file his way, effectively hitting him in the nose. Chase winced and opened the file. "Okay, so he's 26," Chase mumbled.

"Exactly. If he were 62, I wouldn't have taken the case," House said.

"It could be Osteomalacia. That can be caused by a vitamin deficiency or be familial," Taub suggested. House threw a highlighter at him, apparently in the mood for throwing things.

"Read the whole thing, idiots. You're offering me Osteomalacia, Rickets? He's got no family history of Rickets and he's a health food nut. Again, if either of those things were true, I wouldn't have taken the case. God, you'd think I hired you all only for your looks," House shot him down.

"Tch, you did," Cameron murmured. Thirteen gave a sharp exhale next to the blonde, smirking in agreement. House gave his best offended look.

"I only hired the girls based on their looks. And Chase," House defended himself. Chase gave House a "what the hell?" look, but House had already moved on.

"He broke his femur because someone dropped a book on it. That's one of the strongest bones in the body, and all it took was a little English lit to crack it," Thirteen pointed out. "He's in grad school, right? It's hard to get through that without a lot of caffeine." House planted a cup of coffee in front of her that he'd been holding.

"Good, we're getting somewhere. Chase, go ask him how much coffee he drinks a day. Foreman, go get him a bone scan. Thirteen and Cameron, I want you to go to his house and do a search for caffeinated products and what else the health nut is consuming, especially in case he's lying," House ordered.

Thirteen stared at House for a moment. He gave her a blank look in return, which was a clue that he had not so innocent intentions. Thirteen then turned to Cameron. "I'll drive," the brunette offered. Cameron nodded, and the two left for the parking lot.

* * *

A few minutes later, and the two women were in patient's house in Trenton. The doctors searched the house for any caffeine products or any other environmental instigators that might explain the patient's bone softening.

"Don't you think it's a little crazy that we're doing this?" Cameron asked suddenly. Thirteen glanced at her, putting down the large container of coffee grounds she'd been holding.

"Do you mean breaking into a house? Or the 'we' part?" Thirteen asked. Cameron's brow knit together like the other woman's question made her a little unsure. Thirteen thought it was adorable the way worry caused such a visible reaction on the blonde's face.

"Both, actually. I mean, House knows that I don't really think this is moral, but he sent me with you, someone who doesn't care about the morality," Cameron observed. Thirteen chuckled softly.

"That paints a lovely picture of me," the brunette replied. Cameron's face turned to one of regret instantly.

"No, no, that's not what I was trying to say. It's just-" Cameron scrambled.

"House, yeah, I get it. You think he's messing with you again by forcing you to work with someone he sees as your opposite," Thirteen finished for her. Cameron nodded helplessly.

"I didn't mean to say that you have no morals. I mean, who am I to make that judgment?" the older doctor assured the other while riffling through the cabinets.

"The compassionate doctor that always makes the right decisions?" Thirteen surprised her coworker by actually responding to the rhetorical question. "And I'm the heartless and self-destructive one," she added. Cameron shook her head.

"I don't always do the right thing, and I don't believe everything the rumor mill has to say about you, Doctor Hadley," Cameron said, looking Thirteen in the eye. The younger doctor was surprised; not only did the other doctor discount the stereotypes placed on both of them, but she also addressed her by her name, not the meaningless moniker House had been too lazy to remove. Actually, she was surprised Cameron even knew her last name given how no one, except rarely Cuddy, seemed to use it.

Cameron cleared her throat and broke the eye contact, pointing to the array of caffeine products assembled on the counter. "We should get back to the lab," she recommended. Thirteen nodded and the two left for the hospital.

* * *

"So, while you two were gone having much more fun than the rest of us, our patient started twitching and developed tachycardia," House informed the returning two doctors.

Cameron gave House an exasperated glare. "We weren't having fun, we were just collecting data on the patient's caffeine sources," she corrected House. House gave her a defensive look matched with his hands in the air in front of him in a surrendering pose.

"I wasn't inferring anything else. But breaking and entering is always more fun than drawing blood and doing bone scans," House denied any implications.

"Tachycardia plus the bone softening indicates a caffeine addiction. Caffeine is also a diuretic, which would cause it to flush out most of the calcium in his carefully controlled diet. That in turn would cause the bone softening. We found enough Red Bull and soda as well as coffee in his house to stimulate such an adverse addiction," Thirteen summarized.

"Good job," House said without much enthusiasm. Thirteen observed the man for any signs that he was messing with her, but he must have caught her looking because he added, "What, do you want a pat on the head? Go, leave," House asked sarcastically and shooed the doctors out the door.

"No, I don't want your hands anywhere near me," Thirteen replied coolly. She stood to leave, following Cameron out the door.

"I wasn't saying _I _would. I was thinking Doctor Cameron could take care of anything that involved putting hands on you," House snarked. Thirteen let out a sigh and left the room without another word.

Once in the hallway, Thirteen walked beside Cameron. "I don't know what's with him recently," she said.

"For some convoluted reason, he wants to mess with my life. It's not just the slip I made about my sex life- he also has heard that I broke up with Chase, and that makes me a bigger target for his assery," Cameron explained. Thirteen tried to ignore the sudden curiosity she felt on the subject of Cameron breaking up with Chase, but a question slipped out of her anyway.

"What happened with Chase?" she inquired, wanting to retract the question as soon as it left her mouth. Why had she asked? The two of them weren't exactly friends, and Cameron's love life was of no concern to her.

Cameron's face hardened, driving Thirteen's mental self-flagellation even more. "I don't really want to talk about it," the blonde replied, effectively closing off the topic completely.

"Sorry," Thirteen murmured. Cameron glanced at the other doctor in surprise. It wasn't a sarcastic apology like she'd expected, rather it seemed as though the younger doctor really regretted bringing up the subject.

"It's fine," Cameron replied with a more tender voice than her previous remark. The two looked at each other for a moment, Thirteen noticing the softness in the blonde doctor's expression.

"Alright, well I guess I should go inform the patient that he's not dying, but that he should really work on his caffeine addiction if he wants to keep his bones," Cameron said, turning down a hallway with a final smile at the brunette.

Thirteen walked the rest of the way toward the clinic where she'd been headed alone, pondering the day's events. House was certainly up to no good, but that was normal. Thirteen wasn't so sure that Cameron was his only target. After all, why would he have paid her to make Cameron uncomfortable when he could easily have done that himself? It was his specialty.

Then there was how he'd purposely paired the two women up on a task outside of the hospital. She wasn't complaining, because it had been sort of nice to talk to Cameron, something that she didn't usually do. Thirteen wasn't exactly the kind to make friends easily, so she hadn't really gotten to know the other woman very much except through what the other doctors at the hospital said about her. The first thing she'd ever heard about Cameron was that she was absolutely gorgeous, which turned out to be true. She'd also heard that the blonde woman was extremely caring, that she made strong moral decisions, that she had married a dying man, and that she was dating Chase. All of that she knew, but she hadn't even had a conversation with her that lasted more than five minutes before today.

The brunette doctor shook her head, trying to put thoughts of House's games out of her mind, which she did successfully. The other thoughts, the ones pertaining to the woman at the center of his antics, however, did not fade away as easily.


	3. Observations and Invitations

"Hey, Thirteen, do you want to go out for drinks after work? Chase, Foreman, Taub, and even Cuddy are going," Kutner invited. She was on her way to the bathroom when the other doctor caught up with her, so she wasn't exactly in the mood for small talk. Plus, Thirteen really just wanted to go home after the long and stressful day, especially since it was a weeknight.

In the few seconds that Thirteen was considering how to turn Kutner's invitation down nicely, the elevator dinged and opened to reveal Cameron, which effectively removed Thirteen's attention from Kutner. He noticed the lack of focus and looked to see what had distracted the brunette.

"Oh, Doctor Cameron, would you like to go out for drinks today? All of House's team is going except House. We replaced him with Cuddy," Kutner extended the invitation to the blonde. She glanced at Thirteen.

"Are you going?" she asked.

"Yeah," Thirteen replied. She hadn't been planning on going, but a chance to see the blonde, especially outside of work, was too much to pass up.

"Then sure, I'll go," Cameron answered Kutner. It made Thirteen's heart skip a beat. Cameron had just basically said that the only reason she was going out for drinks was because Thirteen was going too. Thirteen fought a stupid grin from rising to her face. Sure, it might only mean that the older woman was starting to think of Thirteen as a friend, but still, that was much further than they'd been a week ago.

There was the sound of a cane hitting the ground from behind the three doctors. "Good, then you can keep an eye on our attractive blonde, make sure she doesn't end up cornered by some scary man now that she's single," House interrupted the conversation.

Kutner, never one to be impolite, started to speak, "Oh, House, if you want to come-"

"Not interested. I don't think we drink at the same places. Mine usually require the women to leave with less clothes than they came with," House cut him off, focusing on Thirteen. "Unless a woman corners her. In that case, just take pictures for me," House fake whispered, resuming his previous comments about Cameron being cornered.

"Never gonna happen," Cameron said in a singsong voice that Thirteen found to be adorable.

"How am I supposed to protect her against big scary men anyway?" Thirteen asked, not really looking for an answer, but rather just to humor House. It worked.

"Because you're a badass," he replied simply. Cameron laughed and House started hobbling away, gesturing for the three to follow him. They entered the diagnostics room where Chase, Taub, and Foreman were already waiting.

"Now, I was under the impression that though this often seems like a social club, we are actually being paid to do something here," House said, pretending to think hard for a moment. "Right! Stripping. No wait, that's just Chase."

"Um, _what_?" Chase asked, not knowing what he possibly could have done this time.

"Don't worry, sweetheart," House reassured him with a wink. "Okay then, Cuddy refused to give me a new case because I replaced her ID photo on the website with a picture of her ass. So we're all pairing off to go do clinic duty today. That means Taub with Kutner, Foreman with Thirteen, and Chase with Cameron. Go!" House said, pushing his hands out in front of him like he was telling a dog to scram.

The three pairs left the diagnostics room without arguing. It was that or stick around with House, and no one was seeing that as an enjoyable option. Thirteen caught up with Chase and Cameron. She felt bad that Cameron had to be stuck with her ex-boyfriend, so she would offer to switch, to let Chase be paired up with Foreman. Yes, that was the only reason why she was doing it, not because she wanted to spend more time with Cameron…

"Hey, Chase, do you mind if I switch partners with you? It's a bit… awkward between me and Foreman," Thirteen lied easily.

"Sure, you can take Cameron," Chase agreed to the swap. Thirteen ignored the several ways that statement could be taken. The two boys met in conversation, leaving Cameron to walk next to Thirteen.

"Thank you so much. I didn't know if I could handle him one on one," Cameron said with relief. Her expression was much more relaxed and had a degree of gratitude displayed.

"Sure, anytime," Thirteen replied.

"So things are uncomfortable between you and Foreman?" Cameron asked in curiosity.

"Nope. We're actually pretty good," Thirteen answered with a small smile.

"Wow, so that was just to save me?" Cameron said, impressed. Thirteen and a silent "and to spend time with you" in her head.

"Pretty much," the younger doctor responded.

"Well good because I'd rather spend the rest of my day with you than anyone else on the team," Cameron admitted. Cue stomach gymnastics. Thirteen's smile grew full at just how kind Cameron could be. The blonde, Thirteen realized, probably had no idea the effect she could have on people. She was so genuine that people couldn't help but take her compliments to heart. Maybe replay the kind words again when they were having a bad day. A considerate word from Cameron could easily turn a person's mood around, especially when watching the compassion facial expressions she would take on.

Thirteen realized that she had been silent for a little longer than normal. "Thanks, same for me," she replied a tad bit awkwardly. The two had only just started to become friends a few days ago when House had started his ridiculous game, so Thirteen didn't really know how to act around the blonde yet.

"I'll meet you downstairs in a minute. I just have to go to the bathroom first," Thirteen informed Cameron, gesturing to the bathroom. Cameron nodded and continued the way toward the clinic while Thirteen entered the women's restroom.

As she finished and washed her hands, Thirteen thought not quite of Cameron, but of House. She wondered if House had known that she was going to swap partners with Chase to be with Cameron. Knowing House, he probably expected it. That meant that there was most likely going to be all sorts of comments involving the two women the next time House approached them. Thirteen grimaced at scenes involving him calling her Cameron's knight in shining armor for rescuing her from the big bad dragon named Chase. Okay, so maybe the modern take on a fairytale book that Thirteen had been reading the night before was on her mind.

When Thirteen arrived at the clinic, Cameron was already taking a patient into a room. It was a mother with her five year old son.

"Hi, what's your name?" the boy asked Cameron.

"You can call me Doctor Cameron," she replied. The boy's gaze turned to Thirteen.

"Hi to you too. What's your name?" the boy asked the brunette.

"Doctor Hadley," she responded. The boy grinned up at her.

"I like your eyes. They're pretty," he giggled. Thirteen smiled at him and Cameron laughed along with the boy. His mom reached out to hold his hand as he gave a loud and rasping cough.

"Okay, so your name's Danny, right? Can you open your mouth for me? Say 'ahh'!" Cameron instructed. The young boy opened his mouth as wide as he could, allowing Cameron to glance inside with a small light and take a quick swab with a cue tip. "Okay, good job. You can close your mouth now."

Danny was looking at Thirteen again. "Your eyes are so sparkly," the boy commented again.

"Thank you. Now, can you sit still while I check inside your ears?" Thirteen asked. Danny nodded eagerly. Cameron motioned to the other doctor that she was going to go drop the swab off at the lab for testing. Thirteen turned her attentions to the boy in front of her and got a good look down his ears.

"That tickles," Danny giggled again. Thirteen backed away from him and turned toward his mom.

"It's probably just a cough, but we're sending the swab to the lab in case he has step too. His throat did look a little raw, but that's probably just from the coughing," Thirteen informed the woman. She nodded.

"Okay, thank you," the mom said politely. Cameron returned and Danny switched his focus to her.

"Did ya notice Doctor Hadley's eyes? I think they're like the sky," the young boy whispered fairly loudly to Cameron. She gave him a smile.

"Sure I have, they're beautiful," Cameron said. Thirteen felt the back of her neck warming over the conversation of her eyes, especially considering that she was being complimented on them. What had she just been thinking about kind words from Cameron making someone's day?

Thirteen cleared her throat. She wrote up a prescription for Danny and gave it to his mother, sending them on their way with a reminder that they should be getting a call about whether or not to come back in for antibiotics.

The next couple of hours flew by. Thirteen decided that even clinic duty wasn't so bad when you weren't doing it yourself, but with a friend. The two worked together to get through more patients than they would have been able to alone and exchanged casual conversation as they did so and in between patients. House may think that forcing his team to do clinic hours was a punishment, but it didn't have to be. They could help people in the clinic, even if they weren't making ground-breaking discoveries about rare diseases.

By the end of the day when it was time to go out for drinks, Thirteen was just glad that House wasn't going to be there, because that would put an unpleasant end on a fairly nice day.

* * *

A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. The next one will contain the team going out for drinks, which can never be a bad thing. And I promise more Thirteen/Cameron is happening. Remember, reviews are like food- they make me work faster and better.


	4. Team Drinking

Thirteen got to the bar a little sooner than she had expected. A quick glance at the clock on the wall told her that it was a few minutes before 8:00, which was the time that the team had set up to meet. Thankfully, she wasn't the only one who was early. Taub and Kutner were arriving just behind her.

"Hey, Thirteen!" Kutner greeted her with enthusiasm. She gave him a polite smile and nodded to Taub who returned the silent greeting.

"You guys came together?" she inquired.

"Yes, that way he can get drunk and not kill anyone. Well, not on the drive home at least," Taub explained. Thirteen had the sudden thought that she should have offered to drive Cameron. It was too late for that, so she moved on to other matters.

The bartender made his way over to the three as they sat down on some barstools. "What can I getcha?" he asked. Thirteen didn't recognize him- buzzed hair with a heavy five o'clock shadow- but then again, she didn't usually frequent bars quite this close to the hospital.

"You're starting out easy," Taub warned, ordering three beers and pointing his index finger meaningfully at Kutner.

"So, how was your clinic duty?" Thirteen asked. She didn't know where to start the conversation if not work, but that was fine considering they'd all been separated that afternoon, so there would be stories to tell for sure. There was the sound of bottle caps opening.

"Not too bad. I think there's strep going around, but then again, it always is," Taub answered first.

"Not too bad? That's only because you made me to the herpes test!" Kutner protested. Thirteen felt relief that she and Cameron had not had to deal with any venereal diseases.

"And that's the worst you had?" Foreman entered the conversation. Thirteen hadn't noticed him come in the bar, probably because of the talk of herpes.

"Hey, Foreman!" Kutner greeted. Foreman ordered a beer and turned to the other doctors.

"We had projectile vomiting. Chase got it all over him, so he's going to be a little late. He said he needed a long shower to 'wash off the sensation.' He's such a girl," Foreman said, quoting Chase with a slightly higher pitched voice to emphasize his prissy comment. The group laughed and Thirteen looked toward the door to see Cameron walk in with Cuddy.

Thirteen's first thought was that Cameron looked amazing. She was wearing nice jeans and a fitted jacket, nothing too fancy, but Thirteen rarely got to see the woman outside of scrubs and a lab coat, so it was a step up.

"Hey, Cameron. Glad you could make it," Thirteen greeted fairly smoothly. "Hi Cuddy," she added. The two girls smiled at her and both ordered some drinks.

"Alright, let's get this started. I had a long day of berating House, and if that doesn't warrant a few drinks, I don't know what does," Cuddy announced.

* * *

Close to an hour and several drinks later, the team was all sharing embarrassing and otherwise interesting stories from their college years. Chase had joined them somewhere in between, thankfully sitting completely away from Cameron such as not to create any situations.

"Okay, I walked into the girl's locker room on a drunk dare from a friend," Kutner said. Chase just laughed at that.

"Done that… but I wasn't drunk," Chase said in response. This was met with a chuckle from Foreman and Taub. "Alright, girl's turn. What about you, Cuddy? Any delinquency in your college years?" Chase asked.

"Not exactly delinquency, but I did kiss a girl," Cuddy admitted. This caught everyone's attention.

"Dude, same," Thirteen deadpanned. Her comment was met with some laughter. Kutner looked amazed.

"Do all girls experiment in college?" he asked in a bit of wonder.

"I didn't. Never kissed a girl," Cameron informed the team. Cuddy stared at the blonde woman.

"How'd you get through college?" the administrator inquired, mostly rhetorically.

"Straight," Cameron said, imitating Thirteen's tone from before.

The conversation took several turns from there going from college stories to worst moment at work to obnoxious House moments. The group of doctors were all buzzed to a degree, some more than others. Taub and Cuddy were both still fairly sober, but Kutner and Cameron were getting the most drunk. Thirteen tried to keep the drinking down so she'd be able to drive home.

The conversation got around to how clinic duty had gone that day. Chase was explaining how he'd picked out the hottest girl in the waiting room for Foreman and him to take as their next patient.

"She was pretty cute… until I saw her in a different light," Chase said.

"And what light was that?" Cuddy asked.

"Covering me with vomit," Chase answered. Cameron snorted lightly, imagining her ex getting vomit sprayed on him with a small level of amusement. Their break up had not been disastrous, but it hadn't exactly been consensual on both sides at first. He'd wanted to keep on trying to make it work, but Cameron was through.

"Well, a five year old flirted with Thirteen," Cameron announced. This intrigued the team somewhat.

"She's moving up in the world," Taub commented. Thirteen gave him a glare.

"Hey!" she said, giving him an offended look to follow up the glare.

"Look, the last of your 'dates' that I ran into went to prison," Taub defended his stance. Thirteen remembered that. She'd gone out with the woman a few times, fairly casually, and one day she had showed up at the hospital to surprise Thirteen. Taub ran into her as she was waiting, and Thirteen had dumped her shortly after. The visit at work was a sign that things were getting too emotionally involved for the young doctor who liked to keep people at a distance.

"So?" Thirteen replied.

"For murder!" Taub exclaimed. Chase's mouth dropped open and Cameron's eyebrows shot upward. Similar reactions were adopted by the others.

"Nope, manslaughter. There's a difference," Thirteen corrected him.

"Really?" Cameron asked, doubtful.

"Yeah, manslaughter means she'll be out in 15 to 20 years, though I'm not thinking I'll wait for her," Thirteen explained.

Thirteen paid close attention to Cameron in all of this. The blonde started getting looser as the alcohol began having an effect. She was laughing more and making more physical contact with people- reaching out to touch their arm when they said something funny, leaning against someone's shoulder. Thirteen kept a relatively straight face when any of it was aimed in her direction. About a little over an hour and a half into the evening Cameron was sitting next to Thirteen and had her arm around her shoulders when she started slipping out of her stool and slowly toward the brunette. Thirteen was hyperaware of this but tried to keep up with the conversation as it happened. After five minutes of slowly slipping, Cameron was practically halfway in Thirteen's lap.

Chase would occasionally give Cameron a weird look like he was about to say something, but he must have thought better of it because he didn't address his ex directly once throughout the night.

Cuddy announced that she was leaving first out of the group. Of course, this was met with much complaining, saying that she was no fun and such. Cuddy made sure Cameron was okay with getting a ride with someone else and then left. Shortly after, Foreman and Chase decided it was time to go home as well.

For the next fifteen minutes, Kutner, Taub, Thirteen, and Cameron stayed and traded tales of their job interviews with House. When those drew to a close, Taub announced that he was going to drag Kutner home. Once they left, Thirteen stood up.

"I'm guessing you'll need a ride home?" she asked the blonde.

"If you don't mind. I could always call a cab," Cameron offered. Thirteen immediately shook her head.

"That wouldn't be very polite of me. Now come on, let's get you home," Thirteen said, helping Cameron out of her seat by grabbing her arm. Cameron allowed herself to be dragged out of the bar and to Thirteen's car. Thirteen opened the passenger side door and helped Cameron in.

"You're such a gentleman," Cameron commented with some giggles. Thirteen brushed off the comment with an eye roll and got in the driver's side. Thankfully Cameron was sober enough to give adequate directions to her house so Thirteen could drop her off.

Once they reached Cameron's house, Thirteen got out of the car to open the door for Cameron and walked her to the door. Cameron stopped them in front of her door.

"Thanks," she said simply, sounding tired. Thirteen gave her a thin-lipped smile in return.

"You should get to bed," the brunette advised. Cameron leaned against the door.

"Yeah, you should too," Cameron responded, her words a little bit unclear. Thirteen reminded herself adamantly in her head that Cameron meant for her to go to her own bed. It was not an invitation.

"Alright. See you tomorrow," Thirteen replied and started to leave. But Cameron stopped her and enveloped her in a tight hug. Thirteen was not expecting it at all, but she responded quickly, wrapping her arms around the other doctor. Cameron was nuzzled against the other woman's neck.

"You're a good friend to drive me home. I'll see you tomorrow," Cameron said. And with that she opened her door and Thirteen turned to get back in her car.

Thirteen tried to clear her mind as she drove the few minutes that it took her to get back to her home. Spending time at a bar with Cameron, who Thirteen realized had rarely left her side all night, was quite enjoyable. She was actually quite fun despite displaying such immovable morals at the workplace. And when she'd hugged her… it just felt right. Cameron was maybe two or three inches shorter than her, so she seemed to fit against her perfectly.

"Straight women are off-limits, Remy," Thirteen reminded herself under her breath as she pulled up to her house. Another voice in her head argued. Thirteen hated that little voice. It was always contradicting the perfectly rational and responsible side of her brain. That voice whispered that all rules were made to be broken.

* * *

A/N: Enjoy? Review! So I'm going to be updating this frequently I hope since I graduate soon and I'll have time. I have the next couple of chapters all outlined, so stay tuned!


	5. Ferrets and Conferences

"So, which one of you got laid last night?" House asked as he came into the diagnostics room 15 minutes late. Six pairs of eyes stared back at him blankly.

"Oh come on," House pressed. He still got nothing.

"Fine then. Did anyone start looking at our next case? I didn't hire this many of you for nothing," House admitted defeat, switching topics.

"The stomach ulcers and gastritis indicate infection, probably Helicobacter pylori," Cameron suggested. House squinted at her, tipping his head slightly to the side as he examined her.

"You got close, didn't you?" House asked.

"Close to what?" Cameron returned with a question.

"You answered my distraction question first, which means you were the most relieved to move on in topic. You got close to getting laid," House answered. Cameron shook her head slightly and looked toward the ceiling as if expecting it to emphasize with her. Thirteen wanted to spit back a comment about how House just projected random drama into the lives of his colleagues, but she knew doing so would only add fuel to the flames. House would misconstrue her defense of Cameron as clear evidence that she was hitting on the blonde. Instead, Thirteen stayed silent.

Thankfully, Chase had an idea, deciding to debate Cameron's possible diagnosis of an infection by offering up an alternative. The debate went back and forth, House allowing each of his ducklings to offer up suggestions and proceeding to shoot down every single one.

"You're more grumpy than usual. What's special about today?" Taub observed.

"Maybe I'm grumpy because I apparently hired an entire team of idiots to do what one janitor could," House grumbled.

"You know, Taub's right. Usually you would tell us to test for all the theories we presented instead of just saying we were all wrong by now," Foreman pointed out. House was about to respond when Cuddy entered the diagnostics room.

"House? I thought I told you no more cases. You're supposed to be getting ready for the conference," Cuddy said.

"Conference?" Kutner repeated. Thirteen's eyes narrowed. House hadn't told them that he was going to be leaving for any sort of conference anytime soon.

Cuddy turned to House's team, taking in their unknowing faces and then turning back to House. "Please tell me you told them," Cuddy said, though it was clear she already knew the answer.

"What's going on here?" Thirteen inquired slowly. House rotated around his cane to get a better view of his team.

"We're going to a conference at Ohio State University Medical Center. We're leaving Thursday and won't get back until Monday. Looks like I forgot to tell you. Oops," House informed his team, his apology sounding nothing like an apology in the least.

Jaws dropped. "House, it's Wednesday. Thursday is _tomorrow_," Foreman said.

"Don't be the black version of Rebecca Black. I know my days of the week," House scoffed. Cuddy's blood pressure was rising, but she just crossed her arms tighter to her chest, trying to manage her rage.

"You should do that more often when you're angry. It makes your boobs stick out," House commented. Cuddy released her tight hold and rubbed her temples.

"I don't even know what to do with you right now. Thank God you'll be away from me starting tomorrow. When you come back, I hope you know that I will make your life a living hell, at least temporarily," Cuddy warned, leaving the room.

As the door started to swing shut behind her, House shouted at her retreating form, "Does that mean no sex?" He received no response and returned his gaze to his very pissed off team.

"Right… so, Taub, go find someone with half a brain who can take over this case. Foreman, I want you and Chase to go get the materials we're supposed to bring to the conference from Cuddy's office. I have to go pay Wilson two hundred bucks on a bet I just lost," House said.

As four of the men left the room, the people remaining looked at each other for reassurance that what had just happened was as infuriating as they thought. "I had plans for this weekend too," Kutner mumbled.

"Let me guess, a videogame tournament?" Thirteen asked with a bit of a smirk. Kutner cleared his throat and straightened some papers in front of him. Thirteen leaned over to mock whisper in Cameron's ear.

"He's currently regretting that he ever invited me over to play World of Warcraft with him," the brunette whispered loud enough for Kutner to hear. Cameron grinned and Kutner ran a hand through his hair.

"Incorrect. I regretted that decision that night when you kicked my ass," Kutner corrected her. The three doctors sat in silence for a few moments.

"So I guess you two will most likely be rooming together," Kutner stated out of no where, gesturing between Cameron and Thirteen. The latter had to stop herself from almost choking on the decaf she'd been drinking. Kutner was right- there were only two women on House's team, and it was a multiple day conference. The hospital surely would pair people up such as not to pay for individual hotel rooms. It was simple math, but with a complex answer. Thirteen would be able to share a room with Cameron.

"Well, that should be fun," Cameron said, nudging Thirteen with her elbow.

"Yeah. Everything except the conference that we're not prepared for," Thirteen replied with a flat voice.

"Oh, come on. We don't even have any idea what the conference is on yet," Kutner added. Foreman and Chase reentered the room at that moment in enough time to hear Kutner's comment.

"It's on teambuilding and hospital safety," Chase revealed with a bitter voice.

"Lovely," Thirteen mumbled. House at a teambuilding conference… she couldn't imagine much worse.

"This probably means a lot of feel good sessions and trust fall exercises. I can't wait," Foreman added.

Taub entered the room looking just as thrilled as the rest of the team. While Chase filled him in on what happened, Kutner wondered aloud, "Do you think they'll have video ports for connecting an Xbox? Or Playstation?"

"If so, I'm coming to your room," Thirteen warned.

"Watch out- House will probably show up too. You know how he loves his PSP. I can't imagine him with a full console and videogames with violence," Cameron said.

"What was that about violence?" House said as he pushed open the door with his cane. He looked a little put out, perhaps by the conference, or the fact that Cuddy was forcing him to do it, or that he had just lost a bet to Wilson about said conference. "Never mind. Now, all of you are going home early today. Cuddy would tell me to tell you to look over the topics for presentation and the daily schedules, blah, blah, blah. She'd also tell me that we should go over it together now as a team, but I'm not feeling like a team spirit cheerleader today," House spat.

The team looked at each other for a minute, trying to decide if there was any sign of this being a screw over, but House seemed genuine. That was usually a bad sign. Everyone started to pack up. Cameron was just walking over to say something to Thirteen. The younger woman could tell because of that determined look the blonde got on her face when she got an idea in her head. She'd seen it when Cameron had a particularly brilliant idea regarding a diagnosis or when she went to tell a patient that they were going to be okay. Or when she used to walk up to Chase toward the end of the day.

"Lesbian! My office," House called out with his back to the team. Cameron froze, only a few steps away from Thirteen. The latter cursed House under her breath and put the last of her things in order before taking her time to enter House's office.

"I'm not a lesbian," she corrected him with a hint of exasperation.

"Close enough," House shook off her correction.

Thirteen glanced back at Cameron apologetically, pushing open the door to the adjoining office.

The door to House's office swung shut behind the brunette as she observed the man typing at his computer. "Yes?"

"Oh, you. Do you think I should put a weasel in Wilson's office or his dresser drawer?" House asked distractedly. Thirteen rolled her eyes, knowing the gesture was lost on him since he was completely focused on his computer screen. He was probably watching porn, knowing him, but he was a good multitasker, also planning revenge on Wilson for their newest prank war and developing some sort of scheme that involved Thirteen.

"Dresser drawer. What was it that you needed from me?" Thirteen answered and questioned simultaneously.

"Why? And I have another offer for you to make a little extra money," House continued both of their conversations.

"Because it will probably be sleeping in his pants. What is it this time?" Thirteen sighed at the second part of the conversation.

"Your logic is being honed, clearly. This time I want sexy pictures of you and Cameron," House said, still having his eyes glued to the screen.

Thirteen was taken aback. "What? Why?" she exclaimed, abandoning the Wilson conversation. "Why don't you just look up lesbian porn?"

"Why do people go to plays instead of just watching a movie?" House shot back. Thirteen groaned, tousling her hair in aggravation. She was so done with this, and she had the whole rest of the day off.

* * *

The next day, the team all came in late as per House's request. The conference wasn't going to start until Friday and it was going to take about nine hours to get to the hotel near Ohio State University Medical Center, so House decided that they would leave around noon.

Cuddy had arranged the transportation, so thankfully that meant that there was a bus taking them the full nine hours to Ohio. The seven doctors, House and his team, all filed onto the bus with their luggage, storing it either under the bus or in the shelves above the seats. The bus ride seemed to take forever in some ways. House started out obnoxiously, of course, cracking crude and racist jokes to the driver who eventually told him to either go sit in the back next to the bathroom or he would kick him off. House took the first option, sitting away from the team, falling asleep within a few minutes. Thank God.

Cameron sat next to Thirteen and ended up making her smile throughout most of the trip, even when part of that time was spent asleep on the brunette's shoulder. Okay, so maybe that part especially made her smile. Kutner and Taub debated on the viability of science fiction novels and their effects on the medical and science world. Chase and Foreman placed bets on who on the bus with them would be getting off at which stop and such. Foreman ended up making a net profit of thirty two dollars.

When the bus got close to the stop that was near the hotel, Thirteen nudged Cameron. The blonde woke up grudgingly. "I think we're pretty much there," Thirteen whispered, not wanting to speak too loudly. A part of her was afraid that if she spoke too loudly that she would shatter this little moment of Cameron looking up at her from her shoulder, so close to her face.

Unfortunately, House ruined the moment instead. "Come on, save the lesbianism for the hotel room," House said, poking Thirteen with his cane. The brunette flipped the gruff doctor off and exited the bus, gathering her luggage and helping Cameron find hers.

Taub offered to check everyone in as long as Kutner took all of his luggage up to his room for him. House was rooming by himself, being the odd man out of the seven, so he took his key and suitcase and hobbled over to the elevator and up to his room alone.

After Foreman gave Thirteen and Cameron their key, the two of them took the elevator up to the third floor of the hotel and found their room. Immediately upon entering the room, Cameron flopped down on the bed closest to the door.

"Sorry," Cameron said, her voice muffled from being buried in the comforter. Thirteen looked at her in amusement, her body spread out across the bed and her face down.

"That's fine. Attractive women falling on beds have rarely upset me before," Thirteen said with a smirk. Cameron rolled onto her side, propping herself up on her elbow.

"I meant that I should've asked you if you cared which bed I took," Cameron amended her previous apology with a light blush. Thirteen felt a little bad for poking fun at the other woman, but Cameron didn't look upset.

The team had all been pissed when House had forced a conference on them with only one day's notice, but who knows? Maybe a conference was exactly what Thirteen needed.

* * *

A/N: Conference, here we come! And remember, the more reviews you lovely people give, the more Cadley/Camteen action you recieve :)


	6. So One, Two, Three

Cameron groaned. "Wha?" she grunted, her eyes still shut. Thirteen squelched the silly grin she was feeling come on at just how cute Cameron looked as she tried to pry her eyes open.

"If you don't get up, you'll probably be late," Thirteen informed the other doctor in a soft voice. Cameron sat up and rubbed her eyes.

"Fine," the blonde murmured. She rose out of the bed and made her way to the bathroom. "I call first shower," she added before shutting the door behind her. Thirteen heard the shower starting, so she tried her hardest not think about what was going on in the bathroom. She was not thinking about Cameron getting in the shower, Cameron with water running down her body, Cameron naked. Nope, definitely not, didn't even cross her mind.

Thirteen shook her head and rummaged through her suitcase, looking for what she would wear. She ended up pulling out the simple gray sweater and dark pants she'd packed. After deciding what her outfit was going to be, Thirteen sat on the edge of her bed, trying to think of something to occupy herself while Cameron finished in the shower.

Thankfully, Cameron didn't take long to bathe and within another minute, the shower was turned off. That meant that Thirteen's mind didn't have much time to wander. The bathroom door clicked open and Cameron walked out with a white fluffy towel wrapped around her. Thirteen felt her mouth grow dry as she drank in the sight. She started at the blonde's wet head and scanned straight down to her legs, enjoying every bit she saw. When people had called Cameron hot before, they hadn't been giving her enough credit. This woman was easily one of the sexiest women Thirteen had ever seen, and that was saying quite a lot.

Thirteen quickly turned her gaze away from the barely clothed doctor, not wanting Cameron to think she was checking her out while she was close to naked.

"You can use the shower now," Cameron informed her. Thirteen cleared her throat though it was dry and entered the bathroom, trying to rid her mind of thoughts that surely should be forbidden.

After the two women were ready, they headed down to the hotel lobby where the team was meeting. Thankfully, the hotel was close enough to the conference building that hospital used that the drive only took five minutes. Thirteen didn't know if she would have been able to put up with the team for another long ride so soon.

The team arrived at the conference area nearest to the hospital and checked in. House, as the designated leader of their group by means unknown, was given nametags with pre-printed names to hand out to the team. House decided to modify some of them, crossing out Dr. Hadley and writing a simple "13" in its place. He also crossed out Dr. Chase and wrote "The Pretty One." Cameron stole his sharpie after that, telling him he was banned from permanent markers for the duration of the weekend.

Soon the team was all seated in the largest room of the conference building with a couple hundred other doctors. The announcer on stage was telling everyone that they were about to start.

"Alright, it's good to see that you're all energetic this morning!" the announcer said into a microphone. He then proceeded to welcome everyone to the conference, thanking Ohio State University Medical Center for sponsoring the event, and giving instructions for the first teambuilding activity. Papers were passed out as he spoke by volunteers to the team leaders; the papers had a list of questions on them.

"This is going to be an easy first activity. Your team leader is going to start by asking the group to answer a question from the list that we've distributed, and then the rest of you are going to go around in a circle and answer. I hope you learn a lot about each other with this experience!" the announcer said cheerily. Thirteen held in a groan. House, asking them all personal questions? As if that didn't happen enough on a daily basis.

All the doctors scrambled around the room to claim a space to get in a circle and start the activity. House led his group out into the hallway where there were significantly less people.

"Well, this should be fun," Taub said, his voice dripping in sarcasm. House flourished the paper with the questions on it.

"Let's see ducklings, the first question is…" House paused dramatically, reading from the list. "What is your favorite color?" He gave the six other doctors that had formed somewhat of a circle an excited grin.

"Okay, pretty one, you go first," House commanded. Chase rolled his eyes.

"Green," he answered without thinking.

Taub was standing next to him, so he went next. "Red." And so it went around the circle, ending with Thirteen who was standing on the other side of Chase.

"Blue," she answered, picking a color out of thin air. She didn't really know where it came from, except for the fact that she'd been noticing that Cameron's eyes as she answered.

"Well that was boring and told me almost nothing of your private lives. Let's hope the next one is better," House scoffed. He looked down at the list of questions and read, "What is your favorite… sex position?"

"Oh, come on. That's not on the list," Foreman complained.

"But it should be," House defended. "Fine. What made you want to become a doctor? See, these questions are boring," House whined. "I have a better idea- I'll go around and tell each of you why you became a doctor."

This was met with confused looks, but House plowed on. "Okay, Taub, you became a doctor because you thought it was what good Jews should do. Foreman, you thought that you were too smart to keep carjacking for the rest of your life. Chase, you thought it would impress the chicks. Kutner, you thought it would keep you from being bored. Thirteen, you wanted to make sure that you could help people because you couldn't help your mom with her Huntington's. And lastly, Cameron, you became a doctor because you have the overwhelming need to care about people and doctors are supposed to care," House explained, pointing his cane at each of his doctors as he talked about them.

"That's not even close," Chase complained. Thirteen said nothing because what he'd said about her was spot on.

"Of course it's not. Half of his reasons were either racist or otherwise insulting. The others didn't make much sense," Taub agreed.

Kutner shrugged. "That is kinda why I became a doctor," he admitted.

"Oh look, not everyone hates me today," House cried out with false happiness.

* * *

The rest of the conference went on without much interesting happening. After the teambuilding activity was over, the large group moved on to a safety conference. That period of time was spent in a variety of ways for the doctors in attendance. Some people sat back and took in the information. Others took studious notes. Others dazed off a little.

House skipped the dazing off stage and fell asleep completely, snoring loudly. Chase, Taub, and Foreman were placing bets on which doctors would get annoyed and glare back at House. Thirteen found herself involved in an intense paper wad throwing battle with Kutner. After launching a particularly violent offensive, she turned to see what Cameron was doing next to her. At first she thought that the blonde doctor was actually taking notes, but upon closer examination observed that she was actually doodling.

"Nice one of House falling off a cliff," Thirteen smirked, pointing at the paper Cameron was drawing on. Cameron looked up in surprise, looking a little embarrassed.

"Yeah, well, I figured there wasn't much I was going to learn much. A safe day at Princeton Plainsboro consists of no one falling into one of House's or Wilson's practical jokes," Cameron responded. Thirteen laughed quietly, looking at what else Cameron had drawn.

"I like the dog chewing on the… wait, is that House's cane?" Thirteen asked. Cameron bit her lip to stop herself form smiling, which was quite endearing. While she was watching Cameron's expression, she failed to notice Kutner preparing for a retaliation. The back of Thirteen's head was pelted by about a dozen of little wads of paper in rapid succession.

"Dammit!" the brunette hissed. She was shushed by a couple doctors sitting in front of her.

"Need any help?" Cameron asked innocently. Thirteen gave her a playful glare, but Cameron just leaned over and plucked a couple of the wads out of Thirteen's hair for her. Thirteen felt her heart rate increase at Cameron's proximity and the sweet act of helping her.

"Thanks," Thirteen said softly, her voice dropping low. Cameron gave her a smile, the kind of smile that made Thirteen's heart melt. Okay, she had to stop this… this… mushiness. It really was uncharacteristic.

So Thirteen just took a deep breath and crumpled up some paper to use in her arsenal against Kutner.

* * *

That night after the safety conference was done and a few guest speakers had talked, there was a dance. Apparently the people who founded the conference had decided that there was no better way to get to know each other than to give everyone some booze and play music. Personally, Thirteen thought it was a great idea. It was how she met most of her "friends" anyway.

So that's how Thirteen ended up leaning against an open bar, tapping her foot to the beat of the music with a glass of wine in her hand. She watched as Chase got passed around from woman to woman. He barely danced more than once with the same one. He was quite a hit. House had not left his seat at the bar once, determined to get so drunk that he wouldn't remember that he had a bum leg.

After a little while, Cameron came up to the bar and ordered a beer. She noticed Thirteen and came to stand next to her.

"Having fun?" the blonde asked. Thirteen shrugged.

"I can't complain. There's free booze, the music's not half bad, and there's dancing," Thirteen replied.

"Well, I can see that you're enjoying the first two parts of that, but I don't see the last one happening," Cameron pointed out. Thirteen thought back to how this event had started off. A few men had asked her to dance, but she'd turned them all down. She wasn't in the mood for some guy she didn't know trying to get in her pants for the night and leaving before daybreak. Eventually the men had stopped. She wondered briefly if they'd told the rest that she must be into girls.

"I might. Eventually," Thirteen said vaguely. Cameron gave her a curious look before reaching down and grabbing the glass out of the younger doctor's hand, placing it on the bar, and then taking her hand and dragging her to the middle of the dance floor.

"What are you doing?" Thirteen half-yelled over the music. Cameron released her hand.

"_We_ are going to dance," Cameron announced, emphasizing the first word. Thirteen proceeded to watch as Cameron started moving to the music, becoming one with the heavy bass line.

The way Cameron's body moved… it was fluid like she knew exactly how to move to capture attention. She wore a smile- no, a smirk- the corners of her mouth upturned just enough. Her eyelids were lowered, but her eyes stared right into Thirteen's. The brunette didn't know what else to do but join in, letting the waves of the music wash over and intoxicate her more than the glass of wine that she left behind half-empty on the bar.

So this was the not-so-innocent Doctor Cameron. God, that girl could turn any man's head and many a woman's. The blonde's body was close enough to Thirteen's that as her arms moved, the younger woman could've sworn they would have touched, but they didn't. So close, but not quite close enough for contact. Thirteen could practically feel the sexual attraction that Cameron seemed to give off.

The music pulsed through them, a pop tune that Thirteen mostly ignored except for the way it made the blonde's body move. The song changed to a fast rock song, and Cameron's dancing changed accordingly. Thirteen mirrored what she saw in front of her, finding herself grinning back at the woman in front of her.

Thirteen caught a lyric: _So one, two, three, take my hand and come with me because you look so fine that I really wanna make you mine._

And she couldn't help herself. Lost in the moment and the song, the younger doctor put her hands on Cameron's hips and started truly dancing with her. Cameron's smirk broke into a real smile, and she put her hands on Thirteen's shoulders.

They danced to a few more songs, changing the style of dancing depending on the music. Now that Thirteen had broken the barrier, Cameron had no problem touching her while they danced. It reminded Thirteen a little of when she was in high school and two dateless friends would dance with each other in place of finding a guy. It was fun and nothing meant to be taken seriously.

When a slower song came on, Thirteen was tempted to stay on the dance floor with Cameron, envisioning the slightly older doctor with her head leaning against Thirteen. But she didn't have the courage. The type of dancing they'd been doing before had a lot of physical contact and sexual energy, but it wasn't as intimate as slow dancing. People danced with their friends all the time, but friends didn't usually dance to slow songs. And, as bittersweet as the truth was, Thirteen was Cameron's friend.

* * *

The dance ended late that night. By the time the two doctors got back to the hotel, it was after midnight. Thirteen was brushing her teeth when Cameron poked her head in the bathroom.

"Think this place has a pool?" Cameron wondered aloud. Thirteen thought about it.

"I'm pretty sure I saw one last night, but I'm also pretty certain it's closed at this time of night," Thirteen replied.

"Want to go anyway?" she asked with a devious expression. Thirteen was surprised- Cameron was suggesting that they break the rules, just for fun. Not to save a life, not to cure someone, just because she felt like it. No way was the brunette going to say no to that. Plus, swimming meant seeing the blonde in a bathing suit. Thirteen was silently thanking every god in the universe that she'd remembered her own simple black bikini.

"How could I say no?" Thirteen replied with a grin.

The two women split up, Cameron in the bathroom and Thirteen in the main room, to get into their bathing suits. As they were getting ready, Thirteen thought of something.

"Hey, Cameron-" she started.

"You can call me Allison. We've been friends for, like, a few weeks, broken into a house together, gone out for drinks, slept in the same room, and I practically grinded on you earlier tonight. Now we're sneaking into the outdoor swimming pool together. I think that qualifies for being on a first name basis," Cameron interrupted. Thirteen cocked her head to the side in the middle of getting dressed.

"Wow, that does sound like a lot. Call me Remy," she responded.

"I plan on it," Allison said confidently. "Who picked the name Remy?"

"My mom," Remy said, feeling her throat constrict.

"Well, it's a beautiful name," Allison complimented, sounding totally sincere. That was the second part of her Allison Cameron has called beautiful.

When Allison exited the bathroom, Remy thought she might have drooled. The blonde was wearing a blue and gold bikini that showed off her taut stomach and otherwise incredible body.

"You ready for this?" the older doctor asked. The other smiled.

"Always."

* * *

A/N: I hope that there was enough Cadley goodness in this chapter for you. I had planned on posting this chapter yesterday but I was experiencing some rough personal problems and didn't. Hopefully this longer chapter makes up for that! The next chapter picks up just minutes after this one leaves off, meaning having fun sneaking into the pool. Reviews are love... Cadley love.


	7. Illegal Swimming

Remy couldn't believe that she was getting ready to sneak out to go midnight swimming with Allison. She felt like she was sixteen again, sneaking out at night for a midnight rendezvous with some friends or a girlfriend. It made her feel giddy, and to make the whole thing better, it was Allison going with her.

The two women put some loose clothes overtop of their swim suits such as not to raise suspicion as they exited the hotel in case they passed anyone on the way. Thankfully, they didn't only not see any of the doctors they'd come with, but they also didn't pass anyone at all except for the very sleepy man at the front desk.

"Is this something that you usually do when you visit hotels?" Remy inquired quietly, still feeling a need to be subtle even though they had exited the hotel doors and were walking around to the side.

"No. But I'm out of state with this woman who does all sorts of crazy things, and I thought this might impress her," Cameron teased.

"Allison, if you wanted to impress me, you should've suggested that we go skinny dipping," Remy teased right back. The blonde swatted her roommate and continued walking.

When they approached the pool, they noticed that it had a fence all the way around it. There was a gate, but it had a heavy duty lock on it.

"Damn, I didn't bring my lock picking set," Thirteen cursed.

"You have a lock picking set?" Allison asked with a raised eyebrow.

"And you don't? Come on, we both work for House," Remy defended. She then started walking around the perimeter of the fence. "Okay, we're going to have to jump the fence," the brunette decided.

Allison looked at the fence nervously. It wasn't that high of a fence, only about as tall as she was, but worry was clear on her face. "You sure about this?" she asked, chewing on her lip.

"Yeah, sure. Look, I'll help you over first," Remy offered. She kneeled down next to the fence and laced her fingers together down in front of her, waiting for the blonde to step in her hands to give her a boost.

Allison took a deep breath and backed up, getting a small running start before allowing Remy to boost her up and over the fence. She did well at first, grabbing onto the top of the fence and pulling herself over, but just as she was passing the apex of the jump, her foot caught on the fence and she tumbled a bit on the way down, landing on her hands and knees with a small yelp.

"You okay?" Remy hissed. She could only see the other doctor through gaps in the fence due to her being on the ground, but she saw her nod.

"I'm fine. How are you getting over though?" Allison inquired, just realizing the possible flaw in that part of the plan. The younger doctor thought about answering, but she decided that actions spoke louder than words. So, she backed up a few paces and took a running leap at the fence, grasping the top of it and vaulting herself over it, bending her knees, and landing perfectly in a crouching position.

"Oh," Allison stated. Remy smirked and stood up, lowering a hand to the blonde to help her stand up. She took it gratefully and the two stood side by side to take in the sight of their goal- the pool.

It wasn't big or glorious, but it had a diving board on one end and steps to get in on the shallow end. Remy realized that she was still holding Allison's hand from helping her up and quickly cleared her throat and dropped her hand. Just because they were friends now didn't mean that she should allow herself to have extended physical contact with the striking blonde.

Allison took the loss of contact as an opportunity to strip off her outer clothes. Remy watched without shame, feeling as though she was allowed to since she was doing the same thing and they were both wearing a bathing suit underneath. That didn't stop it from bringing heat to the brunette's ears.

Remy, having shed her day clothes, entered the pool, staying on the first step. "You coming?" she asked.

Allison stepped in as well, stopping right next to Remy. "It's cold," she said, frowning slightly.

"Don't turn back on me now, it was your idea. Come on, let's go in another step," Remy said. Allison shook her head, causing the other doctor to put one hand on her hip.

"Come on! Together?" Remy pleaded, holding out her hand. The blonde looked at it cautiously before giving in and taking hold of her Remy's fingers. What had Remy just been telling herself about holding hands with Allison? Oh yeah, she didn't care. Because this wasn't about touching the older doctor, she had a plan.

Remy took another step down and Allison's feet mirrored hers. But as soon as Allison made it that step, Remy bolted down the rest of the steps, yanking the blonde along with her, tugging her all the way in.

"Remy!" she shrieked. The brunette muffled her own laughter, releasing her hand, and shushed the other woman.

"Shh! We don't want to get caught," Remy reminded her.

"Sorry. But that was mean! I'm never trusting you to hold my hand ever again," Allison said, pouting. Remy waded around in the shallow end, but Allison stayed right where she was, arms crossed over her chest and with a pout on her face still.

"Don't be cute. You're almost all the way in, just your shoulders now," Remy said. Allison let out an exaggerated sigh before walking down the pool's slope until her shoulders were covered by the water. Her arms were still crossed and her hands rubbed up and down her forearms.

"It's not _that_ cold," Remy stated, rolling her eyes. She was already doing short laps across the short width of the pool.

"Well, it wouldn't feel so cold if I'd had time to get used to it," Allison complained. She did some strokes across the pool to catch up with the brown haired doctor who was treading water in the deep end. She had a look on her face, that determined facial expression that Remy remembered from two days ago.

"What are you-" Remy started to ask, but she was cut off when the blonde put her hands on her shoulders, her determined face turning into a devious one as she pushed down on Remy's shoulders, effectively dunking Remy all the way underwater. She let go only seconds later and Remy surfaced, taking a gasp of air.

"Allison Cameron, you are _so_ dead!" Remy growled. Allison swam away as quickly as she could, laughing the whole way. The younger doctor chased the older one around the pool, trying to get revenge. Finally, she got an idea. She temporarily gave up chasing the woman around the pool and hoisted herself out of the pool and ran around to get near Allison and jumped in practically on top of her. Allison gave a hushed scream and tried to get away, but she was caught. Remy leaped across and grabbed her in a bear hug, pulling her down under with her.

The two woman surfaced, tangled up together. "Well, I think you got your revenge," Allison said with a grin. "Though I'm not sure why you were so mad."

"Because, I didn't want to get a bunch of chlorine in my hair," Remy answered. That made Allison laugh at her.

"Seriously? Remy Hadley, the doctor who will do anything to get a diagnosis, the woman who's not afraid of anything, the one who breaks into houses and swimming pools with me, was afraid of getting her hair wet?" Allison said with a smirk. Remy pushed her away in false anger at her mockery. Immediately after doing so, she realized that she felt colder now that she wasn't sharing the blonde's body heat. Allison must have felt the same way because she crossed her arms again, trying to regain warmth.

"I wasn't afraid. It just makes it harder to do the next morning," Remy explained.

"Oh come on. Your hair always looks fine, no matter what you do with it," Allison shot back. She shivered slightly. "And it really is cold in here," she added.

"Maybe next time you should bring a man to cuddle with and keep you warm instead of me," Remy joked. Allison looked her in the eye and smiled softly.

"But I picked you," she replied.

Remy's heart rate quickened as she thought of the implications of those simple four words. Keeping her flustered insides in check, she balanced her outer expression and responded coolly, "Are you suggesting that we should cuddle?"

Allison giggled, something that made Remy want to do exactly what she'd just asked about. Allison had a sort of adorable charm about her that made her irresistible. Remy had noticed it before, like whenever the blonde would wear her glasses and stare at a file, biting her lip in concentration. Or when she would reassure hurting children during clinic duty.

"I finally see it," Allison said softly. Remy cocked her head to the side. She wasn't sure where Allison's comment was coming from.

"See what?" she asked.

"How you manage to charm so many girls," Allison replied matter-of-factly. Remy swallowed, trying to think of a smooth response to that like she usually did.

"Oh." That was all she could come up with.

"At first I thought it was just your looks, but it's not. You can make a person feel like they're the only important thing in the universe. You just seem to… really care. About every detail," Allison clarified. She stared just past Remy's eyes, like she wasn't quite looking at her. The words thrilled Remy, and they terrified her. Allison was not supposed to think that she cared. No one was supposed to think that. She was the cold and removed Doctor Hadley, better known as the impersonal Thirteen.

"I think you got us confused, you're Miss Compassionate, not me," Remy corrected in a deceivingly bored voice. Part of her wanted to take back what she'd said immediately. That part of her wanted to open up and share how she really did care but that it was easier to pretend that nothing got to her in the hopes that one day she would become numb enough that nothing _would_ get to her anymore. But the other half ran away from any crack in her armor.

"But everyone knows that about me. With you, it's like a hidden treasure, something you don't show all the time, and not to everyone. And then there's the little things you do without realizing it- opening doors for people, helping them with their luggage, boosting them over fences," Allison paused at that to give the brunette a beautiful smile. "You naturally want to take care of people. It's extremely charming," she finished.

Remy tried to focus on everything that had just been said. She bobbed up and down in the water, moving her fingers to feel the small amount of resistance the water had against the movement. "So you think I'm charming?" Remy asked.

"Is it bad if I say yes?" Allison questioned in return. Remy couldn't help but smile, despite the doubts she was having not two minutes before.

"No," she replied honestly.

"Then yes, I do," Allison confirmed. The two of the looked at each other for another half a minute, both pondering what exactly had just happened. Remy felt something creeping up her spine- was it discomfort? Anticipation? She couldn't quite place it, but she felt the need to move.

"I think we should probably get out now before we both end up like raisins," Remy suggested. Allison nodded and the two of them got out of the pool and walked over to their clothes.

"Shit," Allison whispered.

"What?" Remy asked in confusion. Allison pointed to their clothes.

"We forgot towels."

* * *

A/N: I thought that we were due for a little bit of true fluff. Next chapter will be the next day of the conference, so House and the rest of the team will make an appearance of course. Reviews equal more motivation which equals faster updates, of course!


	8. Finding Answers

Saturday morning did not come easily. Thirteen and Cameron both woke up feeling tired, possibly because they didn't end up actually going to sleep until after two in the morning. They took turns washing the chlorine out of their hair and otherwise using the bathroom, finally ready to meet the rest of the team down in the hotel lobby.

"Glad you decided to join us," Taub said dryly. He was glancing at the clock with a bit of irritability.

"Don't blame them. The morning after can be exhausting," House commented. Remy rolled her eyes. There it was again, the assault on Allison's sex life. She'd just been beginning to think that House was done with that particular annoying goal and was moving on, but clearly she had underestimated his persistence.

The team arrived at the conference and sat down, none looking thrilled to have to go through the procedure again- teambuilding and then a safety talk, possibly followed by more teambuilding. The announcer got up on the stage and tapped the microphone, making sure it was on.

"Alright everyone, today we're going to be doing everybody's favorite teambuilding exercise," the announcer said with excitement evident in his nasally voice. His enthusiasm was not mirrored by the mass of doctors in front of him. A couple people might have bothered to glance up at the most. Undeterred, the announcer went on. "Trust falls! This is a very important exercise for us to do because, as doctors, we are part of a team, and teammates need to trust each other. And what better way to show your trust than to fall back into your awaiting teammate's arms? You're placing your body in their hands quite literally."

House leaned over to whisper to Remy, "In that case, we should all just have sex with each other." She snorted lightly, actually appreciating one of House's jokes for the first time on this trip. "So when we get back to the hospital, we can do 'trust exercises' more often. Go ahead, tell your girlfriend," he added.

"But Cuddy told me not to call unless it was an emergency," Remy replied in an innocent voice. House didn't have time to reply because all the doctors in the room started milling around, assembling into groups like they had the day before.

Once the team had reached a more secluded area of the hallway outside of the conference room, House spoke again. "So, let's pretend for a moment that this is a democracy. Let's vote on who they think should have to go first. All in favor of Chase?"

No one raised their hand. "Fine, all in favor of replacing this with something more juvenile?" House tried again. Every hand went up but Foreman's. "Why not, oh Dark One?" House asked with false reverence.

"Because whatever you have in mind is probably going to be worse than me ending up on the floor because no one bothered to catch me," Foreman answered.

"Fair enough. See, Mr. Announcer got something wrong- being part of a team of doctors isn't about trust. It's about how much you know about them. Well, how to find out about them. The more you know about your fellow teammates, the more you know where their mind is going to jump, their prejudices and biases, and you can keep them objective. With that in mind, we're going to play truth or dare," House enlightened the group.

Remy felt a little relieved- she was, after all, great at avoiding answering questions and deflecting and she wasn't usually afraid to do things that might embarrass other people. Truth or dare was her game. She noticed that her fellow team members had varying degrees of annoyance plastered on their faces. But hey, it was better than trust falls, right?

"Kutner, you first. Truth or dare?" House started. Kutner thought about it for a moment.

"Dare," he replied. House grinned like he knew that was going to be the answer.

"Go find a ladder and walk under it," House demanded. Kutner looked at him quizzically.

"But there's no-"

"Find one. But before you go, pick someone to go next," House cut him off. Kutner, baffled, looked around at the group.

"Cameron. Truth or dare?" he asked the obligatory question.

"Truth," Allison sighed, clearly not thrilled with having to pick either choice.

"Okay. Tell us why you broke up with Chase," Kutner said. Chase stared at Kutner, communicating with the look in his eyes that he thought Kutner was an absolute idiot. House, fascinated, didn't even have a comment to make, too afraid that he would discourage an answer.

"Really? I broke it off because of, what's it called? Irreconcilable differences," Allison answered vaguely. Chase adopted a brooding sort of look that didn't suit him.

"That's not a real answer," Kutner complained.

"It works for divorce court. And go find a ladder," House said, bored with Kutner. Kutner shrugged and walked away out of sight, searching for an elusive ladder.

"House, truth or dare?" Allison asked. Remy was surprised that she picked him considering that she appeared so pissed at him.

"Oh, goody. Truth, because I'm a cripple," House picked.

"Why are you such an asshole?" Allison spat. She looked angry, but there was also a small hint of humor in the glare she was giving her boss, though Remy wasn't sure if anyone else picked up on it. To most, it would seem that Allison was just lashing out with a pointless question, eager to have her turn be done, but Remy suspected there was more to it than that.

"Because Thirteen stole Cuddy from me," House whined in response. "Speaking of, Thirteen, you're up. Truth or dare?"

Remy thought about it. She wasn't one that particularly liked answering personal questions, and any question from House was bound to be obnoxiously personal. She didn't really want to end up doing something to make a fool of herself, but hey, she'd done it before without much issue. Maybe, if she was lucky, she'd get a dare just meant to get rid of her like Kutner. She doubted House had any reason for that dare but to get rid of him.

"Dare," she decided. House grinned, making Remy rapidly regret her choice.

"You have to make out with Cameron," House said. Remy's eyes immediately snapped to Allison. The blonde had her mouth ajar slightly and was staring at House as if he'd just suggested that she go jump off of the roof of the building. That did not exactly encourage Remy in the least. Sure, she wouldn't mind kissing the blonde doctor, but not because House told her to, and certainly not with the rest of the team watching and salivating.

"No. Pick something else," Remy refused in a monotone.

"Cheater," House accused her. Remy raised an eyebrow, challenging him. House admitted defeat, at least temporarily, and conjured up another dare. "Flash the announcer before we leave today."

At least she'd never have to see him again. "Deal," Remy agreed. She then turned to the team to pick the next person to go. Teambuilding with House in charge was more like how much you could humiliate each other with embarrassing questions and daring actions than actually learning about each other or gaining trust.

* * *

"I hope you all learned that you can trust your teammates to catch you both physically and metaphorically," the announcer said. He probably thought that to be quite clever. "Without any further ado, we will be moving on to our next topic in hospital safety- what to do when a patient is volatile."

The speaker for the day took the stage, and much like the day before, House and his team did not exactly pay much attention. They were used to dealing with volatile, after all. If a patient got too out of control, they were either trying to make that happen, or they'd just give him or her a sedative. It wasn't complicated, but it seemed to work for the most part.

Remy zoned out for ten minutes before taking in her surroundings to find out what everyone else was doing. House had brought his PSP, no surprise there, and Kutner kept looking over his shoulder to see how well he was playing. Foreman and Taub were playing football with a piece of folded paper. But what was most interesting to Remy was that Chase and Allison were deep in a hushed conversation and neither of them looked very pleased. Chase was animated, making a lot of gestures with his hands like he was having trouble getting his point across and Allison was looking at him with her brows furrowed and from time to time shaking her head in disagreement. Remy listened closely to try to pick up parts of their conversation since only Foreman and Taub were sitting between her and the two blondes.

"…not the point. You never even gave me a good enough answer," Chase said. Allison rubbed her temples in distress.

"I told you then, and I'm not about to explain myself again, Robert," Allison whispered back. Remy was intrigued. Was Chase upset because of Allison's answer during the game of truth or dare? Remy pondered that, remembering how Allison had avoided talking about why she and Chase broke up when the brunette has asked before.

Before Remy could hear any more of their conversation, Allison got up and left the conference, walking with purpose in the direction of the hallway. Remy was about to get up to follow her, but Chase stood up too, excusing himself to Foreman and Taub, telling them that he had to go to the bathroom. House looked up from his game to see the two leave, but he just shook his head and returned to his handheld game.

Chase and Allison fighting was not a good sign at all. It couldn't have been very long since they broke up considering that just a few weeks ago Remy had seen the two of them leaving the hospital together hand in hand. Not too long after that, she noticed that the two of them rarely even spoke a word to one another. She had suspected trouble in paradise, which was confirmed when she'd had lunch with Allison for the first time at the hospital. Remy chewed her lip, anxiously waiting for the fighting couple to return.

* * *

Remy did not see either Chase or Cameron until after the conference was over and dinner was provided in a cafeteria next to the main conference room. She saw Allison first, walking up to a long table to get some food. Remy followed her, coming up behind her, filling a paper plate with some lasagna.

"Hey. I missed your anti-House doodles during the safety talk," Remy greeted. She received a halfhearted smile in response and Allison made her way to an empty table far away from the men of the diagnostic team. "Allison, is everything okay?" Remy asked with concern, placing a hand tentatively on the other woman's arm.

"I'm fine. Let's just eat and get this over with so we can get back to the hotel and I can get some sleep," Allison said, her voice sounding hollow. She moved out of Remy's reach and sat down at the table.

"You should tell me about it," Remy suggested seriously. Allison stabbed a piece of pasta with her fork and twirled it around absently before eating it.

"What makes you think that it was even something bad?" the older doctor inquired, staring at her next pasta victim. She stabbed it with so much force that Remy was sure she punctured the paper plate.

"Well, for one, you're murdering your pasta," Remy pointed out. Allison put down her fork in shame. "Plus you're eyes are slightly puffy and you're wearing less makeup than this morning, which probably means that you were crying and washed some off but didn't have any with you to replace it," she added.

"God, Remy, you sound like House," Allison murmured.

"Well, you liked House, didn't you?" Remy offered. She instantly started kicking herself mentally- this was not the time to insert comments about why Allison should be interested in her.

"What does that possibly have to do with me fighting with Chase?" Allison asked, tilting her head to the side.

"Aha! So you admit that you were fighting with Chase," Remy exclaimed.

"Okay, fine. Chase was upset with what I said to Kutner. Actually, he's upset with the entire thing, with me breaking off our relationship," Allison said, twirling her dinner around with the fork she'd previously abandoned.

"Why did you?" Remy asked, just as much concerned as curious.

"I realized that our entire relationship was based on mistakes. It was a mistake to get high on meth. It was a mistake to invite Chase to my place while I was high. It was a mistake to sleep with him while I was high. It was a mistake to start a friends-with-benefits relationship with him, and it was a mistake to allow that to turn into real feelings. And I couldn't be in a relationship with someone where, at every turn, I was only still there because of something I regretted," Allison explained.

Remy watched Allison's expression change as she explained the reason why she broke up with Chase. It started very guarded, like she wasn't sure she should be sharing at all, but it slowly changed to plain vulnerability. By the end, the other doctor looked like she was in fear of her reason being rejected by another person. Remy knew how hard it could be to open up to someone, and her heart seemed to swell some just at the thought that Allison was trusting her enough to lay this out for her, to make herself vulnerable.

Remy got up from her seat and walked around the table to the seat right next to Allison and put her arm around the other doctor's shoulders. "That makes sense. Your decision to leave him, I mean," she assured her. Allison leaned into the embrace and let out a long sigh as if she'd been holding her breath in wait for approval.

"Thank you," Allison whispered, her breath beneath the brunette's ear causing goose bumps to rise on Remy's neck. "You know, I'm not even really hungry," she added in a more normal voice.

"I figured the only reason you were eating was to have an excuse to stab something and pretend it was Chase's eyeballs," Remy said, nodding sagely.

"Minus the 'eye'" Allison corrected. Remy burst out laughing and Allison joined in, detaching herself from Remy's shoulder. As she laughed, she looked at the younger doctor in the eyes, locking her gaze. When the laughter died away, the blonde continued looking straight at the other woman. "Thank you. For understanding. And for even caring enough to ask. And for not taking no for an answer when I refused to tell you at first. And… everything," she rambled slightly, not that Remy cared. She was soaking up every moment of it.

"Anytime," Remy replied. Allison grinned at her and leaned forward to place a quick peck on her cheek before standing up.

* * *

Later that night, as Remy was falling asleep, she held her hand to her cheek, trying irrationally to feel the warmth and softness from Allison's lips once more, trying to bring back a memory to the surface. It didn't work, but it did succeed in making Remy go to sleep with a smile on her face for the second night in a row.

* * *

A/N: Alright, that was actually the hardest chapter of this for me to write yet. I hope it was alright, please let me know what you thought. As always, reviews charge my writing batteries.


	9. Playing to Win

The next morning, Remy woke up thinking about what she'd gone to sleep remembering- the day's events. The day had started out crazy, especially when she had been dared to flash the announcer. Never one to disappoint an audience, Remy did so immediately before leaving the conference area for dinner. His face, she would admit, was priceless. And then the day had some low points; she'd overheard a little bit of Chase and Allison arguing and later had her suspicions confirmed by a vulnerable Allison. But then, the day had taken a complete one-eighty when Allison had started laughing and kissed Remy on the cheek. It was a friendly gesture, one meant to thank someone for listening and caring, but to Remy it was the highlight of her day. Or month.

Just as Remy and Allison were just about to go downstairs to meet with the rest of the team, Allison sat down on the bed.

"What's up?" Remy asked. Allison looked like she was thinking hard, and after what had happened the day before, she knew that it might be about something negative.

"Do you blame Chase for being upset with me?" the blonde asked in return.

"Of course not," Remy answered. Allison looked at her, perplexed, leading Remy to explain what she meant by that. "He's upset because he missed out on being with an intelligent, caring, and gorgeous woman. Who can blame him for that?"

Allison seemed marginally reassured. "You think I'm gorgeous?" she inquired. Remy wanted to smack her head against the wall. Here she had been calling the older doctor gorgeous since before they'd even met, and Allison didn't even know she thought it at all.

"Is it bad if I say yes?" Remy echoed Allison's words from Friday night. Allison grinned up at her and stood up.

"No," Allison replied.

"Then yes, of course I think you're gorgeous," Remy answered.

The two women took the elevator down to the lobby where the team was assembling. After waiting five more minutes for Kutner and Taub to show up, they were set. The team arrived at the conference center in plenty of time to start.

* * *

"Today we will be doing teambuilding exercises all day. Isn't that fun? We will start by splitting up into groups like we have before and doing the human knot," the announcer said. Remy groaned audibly.

"So, who's a fan of skipping today's activities altogether and going bowling? I skimmed a bunch of free tokens and lane passes off of the guy in front of me," House asked. No one was about to object to that.

House led his band of miscreants out of the back door of the conference room, like they always did, but this time instead of stopping and forming a circle, the seven continued on right out the front door. No one was even watching, which was simultaneously good and boring, if you were thinking in the mindset of House.

They then all piled into the van they'd been renting to get to and from the hotel with House at the wheel. He drove the ten minutes that it took to get to the local bowling alley and parked the car, not even bothering to do it correctly, ending up taking up two entire parking spaces.

"You park like an old woman," Remy pointed out. House showed her one of his favorite uses for his middle finger, but she just grinned cheekily back at him in return.

The team filed out of the van and into the bowling alley. House paid for the group and got two lanes- Chase, Foreman, Taub, and Kutner in one; Cameron, Thirteen, and House in the other one. They all also got the rented bowling shoes, most of which sported a particularly unattractive combination of brown and yellow.

"Why couldn't you put Kutner in out lane?" Allison asked as the team split up. Unfortunately, the lanes were on opposite sides of the bowling alley, which would make it difficult to have conversations with the other half of the team.

"Because there's no getting rid of me. I'm like herpes, but more fun," House chirped happily.

"Actually, you can treat for herpes with-" Allison started.

"You can't cure the world. And you can't rid the world of me," House shot her down, looking proud of himself as he limped over to the lane and started putting in their names.

"We could kill you," Remy offered to the conversation.

"Always an option for the violent. We can't deal with it? Oh, let's kill it!" House snarked. The two women looked up to see that House had finished inputting their names- God, Blonde, and Lesbian, in that order.

"Wow, I didn't know we were playing with God today. If so, I would have brought my lucky bowling ball, the one with a crucifix painted on it," Remy said sarcastically. Allison laughed and watched as House hobbled up to the lane with a blue bowling ball in hand.

"You know, this conference wasn't as bad as I was expecting it to be," Allison confessed to Remy while House was busy trying to egg his bowling ball toward the center of the lane with wild hand motions.

"We only actually went to two days of it," Remy pointed out. Allison shrugged.

"Hey, that's two-thirds of it. Plus, we were only going to do teambuilding all day at the conference. Bowling and lunch later is teambuilding," Allison pointed out. House walked back from the lane, cursing the ball since he'd only knocked down three pins total. "Looks like I'm up."

Remy watched as Allison got into position to throw the ball down the lane. She didn't notice House watching her watch at first until he spoke. "Had enough of staring at that ass? Don't answer that, of course you haven't. More importantly, did you get the pictures?"

"Shut up, House. No, I did not give into your juvenile desire to see Cameron and I making out," Remy responded blandly. Allison started jumping up and down at her success- she'd bowled a spare.

In celebration, the blonde embraced Remy in a quick and tight hug, squealing in her ear. Remy laughed at her antics and patted her back awkwardly, unsure of how to properly respond to the physical contact while House was sitting right there looking smug.

"Lesbian, it looks like you're up," House interrupted the moment.

"House, how many times do I have to tell you? I'm not a lesbian," Remy sighed. She went over to grab a bowling ball.

"Sorry, I tend to focus on the better halves of people," House apologized. Remy rolled her eyes, mostly for Allison's benefit, before chucking the bowling ball down the lane. She watched it roll, going fairly straight until, at the last second…

"Damn!" she cursed as the ball went into the gutter. House snorted in appreciation of her level of suck before she retrieved the ball from the dispensing machine for her second part of her turn. This time, she managed to knock down nine out of ten. It wasn't as good as Allison's, but at least she didn't suck as bad as House.

* * *

"So who won for you guys?" Allison asked when the team convened after the game was done.

"Surprisingly, Kutner won. Apparently he was in a bowling league in college," Foreman answered. Kutner looked at the other sheepishly, a little embarrassed about that part of his history. "How about with you?"

"Cameron won. House came in dead last," Remy answered.

"I should have had a handicap. I _am_ handicapped, after all. And Thirteen, you should feel ashamed of yourself for being so thrilled to have beaten a cripple," House whined.

"So, are we gonna use up those tokens now or what?" Kutner asked in excitement. House reached into his pocket and pulled out a baggy of bronze colored tokens and allowed Kutner to reach inside and grab some followed by the rest of the team. Once they'd all received some tokens, the team walked to the back of the bowling alley where there was an average sized arcade with a nice variety of games.

Allison led Remy toward a game of air hockey, where Remy practically slaughtered her, simultaneously enjoying Allison's erratic movements as she tried in vain to protect her goal.

After playing that and a few other stupid games, most of the team congregated around one of the dancing games to watch Chase go up against Kutner. Bets, of course, were being placed on the winner. Remy and Allison started watching, but got bored quickly, neither one of them having any money on a winner. Instead, they traveled over to a soda machine to get some drinks.

"You know, a while back I was going to quit House's team. I even handed him my letter of resignation," Allison said suddenly as she pressed the button to get a Diet Coke.

"Really? Why? I mean, besides the obvious of him being a bastard," Remy asked. She didn't know where this conversation was coming from exactly, but she wasn't about to stop it. Each new thing she learned about Allison was like a treasure that she was supposed to hold tight to her chest. No, she shouldn't be thinking about "Allison" and "chest" in the same sentence.

"I gave him two weeks notice, and he started interviews for my replacement. He ended up narrowing it down to three- Kutner, Taub, and you. House went to Cuddy right in the middle of my last meeting with her to ask for her opinion, completely ignoring the fact that I was there. And when I heard him describing the people who were possibly going to take my place… well, I had to know more. So, on my second to last day, I spied on the diagnostics room and watched you guys running a differential. And that was when I first saw you," Allison paused, feeling a little sheepish that the first time she'd seen Remy was when she was spying on the room.

"Anyway, I couldn't really hear what was going on, but House must have insulted someone because I saw you smile, sort of hiding it in your file on the patient. It was a sort of smug smile, and it irked me. I did not want to be replaced by just another haughty and pretty face. So I stormed back into Cuddy's office and demanded to have my resignation papers voided. She looked at me funny, saying that she had no resignation papers on file for me. That was when House came into her office too. Apparently he had the whole thing figured out- he knew that if I saw the people who might replace me I would get annoyed enough to stay. So I guess I have you to blame a little for making me stay," Allison finished.

Remy processed what the blonde had just said, thinking about how if House's plan had failed, like his plans sometimes did, she would never have met this woman who was quickly becoming not only her closest friend, but infatuation as well.

"That sounds just like House. But what makes me wonder is how he ended up keeping all six of his team," Remy posed the issue. Allison grinned in response.

"Cuddy thought that Chase, Foreman, and I would keep him in line while you, Kutner, and Taub would appeal to his ways of medicine. It was a compromise. Plus, she'd recently received a large donation from one of House's patients who demanded that the money be used in the diagnostics department, so Cuddy could afford to keep us all," Allison answered.

"If a doctor at any other hospital were to hear all of this they'd think we were working for a madhouse," Remy pointed out.

"If a doctor at any other hospital met House, they'd _know_ we were working at a madhouse," Allison changed the sentiment. The two women laughed at the thought of any normal doctor meeting House.

"So, do you think Chase has embarrassed his ass off by now?" Remy inquired.

"You know, Chase isn't that bad of a dancer," Allison noted. Remy felt a little pang of jealousy before looking closely at her friend's face. There was a hint of teasing there. "No where as good as you though," she added, much to the brunette's content.

"Have you ever seen Kutner though? He wins at most videogames, even the dancing ones," Remy argued.

"Again, he's not as good as you at videogames. You know, it's a good thing you're not playing," Allison reasoned. Remy gave her a smile, her confidence inflated.

"Well, when I play, I always play to win," Remy said, thinking about more than videogames and dancing.

* * *

A/N: Okay, first of all, I am sooo sorry for not updating as quickly as I usually do. For the past three days I've been throwing up, so yeah, not fun. That's also why this chapter is not as long as the previous ones, I hope you guys don't mind. Please review to let me know what you've been thinking of this. The next chapter will most likely have the doctors returning to New Jersey.


	10. Shutting Up Now

Sunday turned out to be the best day of the entire conference. After bowling, the team went out to lunch at a local Italian place, which had pretty good food. Once they'd finished eating, the team decided to go back to the hotel and go swimming. It wasn't as enjoyable as when Remy had gone swimming with just Allison, but it was great to send her looks and bust up laughing, both of them remembering that night of breaking into the pool.

House refused to remove himself from the hot tub, claiming that "the big pool" wasn't designed for cripples. For a man who didn't want people to treat him like a cripple, he certainly mentioned being one quite a lot.

For a while, Allison was floating across the pool on one of those blow-up rafts, looking peaceful and beautiful, until Kutner whispered to Remy that they should dunk her out of it. Getting an evil smirk, Remy agreed and swam around out of Allison's view before diving under the water and swimming under the raft. She then surfaced, succeeding in flipping Allison off of the raft with a squeal.

"Remy!" Allison growled. Remy swam away in fear of the wrath that was Allison Cameron pissed off. Chase looked at his ex in curiosity, picking up the use of Thirteen's first name. When Remy looked over her shoulder, she noticed Chase's expression and cursed under her breath. It wasn't exactly like her newfound friendship with Allison was something she felt the need to hide, but it would surely bring on a whole new round of harassment from House if he knew. Thankfully, he was busy turning into a prune in the hot tub.

* * *

The hotel was rented for one more night, so the team all went inside after a good bit of swimming. Kutner ended up setting up Playstation in his room, much to the delight of the other doctors, who all took turns playing. They then got dinner at the attached restaurant to the hotel and retired to their hotel rooms for the night.

"It's only eight, and I'm no where near ready to sleep yet," Allison complained once she and Remy got back to their room.

"Okay, we could go break into Kutner's room and play a videogame again," Remy suggested.

"No, I'm sick of games today," Allison groaned. "Why don't we just curl up and watch a movie?" she offered. She found the remote and turned the television on to find something good playing. Remy sat down on her bed, noticing a problem immediately. With the way the small room was situated, the television was positioned directly in front of Allison's bed, making it very difficult for Remy to see.

Allison settled on a rerun of a Harry Potter movie and Remy tried sitting on the closest edge of the bed to the television and craned her neck to attempt to see better. About five minutes into the movie, Allison looked over and saw her brunette friend struggling.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, I should have known you couldn't see from there. You can come over here," Allison said, scooting over to make room for Remy to sit next to her.

"I'm fine, really," Remy turned down the offer, keeping her gaze firmly on the teenage witches and wizards on the screen.

"Seriously, come on. I promise I won't bite," Allison pushed. Remy had a great comeback prepared about how she would, but didn't find it appropriate when she was about to give in and share a bed with the woman. But really, didn't Allison know Remy was bisexual? Didn't she know this would only tempt her? Being friends with someone as beautiful and sweet as Allison Cameron could be difficult.

With a short sigh, Remy gave in and got off her bed and onto Allison's. She sat on the very edge, making sure that there was absolutely no contact between the two of them, nor any chance of it. In fact, she was pretty sure half her butt was hanging off the side. She sat stock-still, not moving a muscle, and tried to take in what was happening on the screen. Allison seemed to be enjoying it, which was good, but she glanced over and saw how uncomfortable Remy was.

"Oh, come on," Allison repeated. "These beds _were_ made big enough for two," she teased. Remy, in spite of herself, smiled at the joke. It poked at a particularly sensitive nerve, the one of her sharing a bed in a completely platonic way with a straight woman, but it came from Allison, which automatically made it adorable and funny. God, she sounded like a lovesick puppy. What had happened to her denial?

Remy eased into the bed a little more, allowing her body to be safely on the bed, but she still made sure that her arm didn't so much as brush against the blonde's. There was silence as the two watched the movie, rather, as Allison watched and Remy freaked out internally.

The movie had started partway through, so at first Remy had a hard time identifying which one it was, only going off the age of the actors. But as she caught bits and pieces of it, she realized that it was the second movie in the series. The scene with the giant spiders came up and Allison yelped.

"What, don't like spiders?" Remy inquired. Allison shook her head vigorously.

"They're creepy! They have too many legs, too many eyes, and the way they move is just… creepy," she summarized in a huff. Every time the movie would pan toward the enormous spider, Allison would grasp at the blankets on the bed and curl up a little more. When it was revealed that there was actually a whole colony of mammoth spiders and said beasts started chasing the young heroes, Allison actually raised the blankets over her eyes.

Remy took pity on her and couldn't help it- she reached out and put an arm around Allison. It was no more than she'd done before, no more intimate, but it felt different, probably because they happened to be sharing a bed. Allison instantly curled into the embrace as if to find safety.

"Sorry, I really hate… spiders," Allison muttered. Remy chuckled lightly at how childish that sounded. Sure, everybody had their irrational fears, but for one reason or another it made no sense for a doctor to be afraid of something as harmless as a spider.

"It's fine. I'll tell you when it's done," Remy said, gently running a hand through Allison's hair. She knew she shouldn't, but she couldn't stop herself. It was like the analogy of putting an alcoholic in a liquor store- he can't stop himself from drinking. Well, put Remy in close proximity to Allison, and she couldn't help but indulge herself.

"It's done. The car got them out and drove back into the forest on its own," Remy informed Allison when the scene changed.

"Okay," Allison said as she emerged from her cocoon of blankets. She did not, however, remove herself from Remy's arm. The brunette let it go for a few minutes, trying to watch the movie and ignore the wonderful feeling of Allison slowly falling asleep in her arms. No. This shouldn't happen.

Remy abandoned the movie completely to look down at Allison. She decided that if she could freeze this moment in time, with Allison peacefully in her arms just about to drift off to sleep, she would. It was perfect except for one thing…

"Allison," Remy said so quietly she practically breathed the name. Allison opened her eyes slightly. She looked like a sleepy angel. "You should… I should…" she trailed off, not wanting to get the point across that they shouldn't be doing what they were doing. Allison said nothing.

Remy closed her eyes and breathed in, loving even the scent of the other woman. She was intoxicating. So when she opened her eyes to find the moment not yet shattered, she could not help herself. She leaned down until her lips just barely brushed the other woman's forehead. It was chaste, over in a moment, but it was surely a mistake. Remy pulled away slowly, not wanting to make the situation worse by any sudden movements. To her surprise, Allison simply closed her eyes and took a deep breath, in and out.

"I…" Remy stuttered. She wanted to find some way to explain herself, to assure Allison that she meant nothing by it, that it was supposed to be a friendly gesture. But the other part of her warred against the idea that she should make everything return to the status quo, pretending that she felt nothing for the beautiful doctor. That part of her wanted to take a risk. She ended up in limbo, words undecided on the tip of her tongue as her mind waged the war of safety versus the possibilities that came with risk.

Allison sat up, removing Remy's arm from her. But before Remy could even start to process the disappointment, Allison had taken a hand to Remy's face, gently outlining her cheek. Remy barely dared to breathe. Allison's hand fell away, and the moment seemed broken.

"Listen, I probably shouldn't have-" Remy started to explain, but she was cut off, she might add, by the most fantastic way she'd ever been cut off.

Now, with a boss like House, she'd been interrupted plenty of times. By insults, by medical data, by files being thrown at her face, and even by awkward displays of insanity. But never, not once, _thankfully,_ had she ever been cut off by her boss in quite this manner.

Allison placed a hand under Remy's chin, pulling her toward her softly. Allison's eyes fluttered shut in anticipation. Remy had a sudden understanding of what was happening, but she didn't stop it. She didn't want to. She couldn't. No, she was one person against a train, what could she do to stop it? She was left to just watch until the last second when Allison's lips touched hers, and then she could keep her eyes open no longer.

It was just a light brush, like a timid teenager that had been afraid to miss their target, but it was like fireworks to Remy. Bright and hot and signaling some sort of victory. Allison's hand did not even have time to fall away from Remy's face before she pulled away, eyes still closed as if she was afraid that when she opened them, everything would disappear.

"Allison," Remy breathed her named again. It was somewhere between the start of a sentence and the end of a breathtaking dream.

"Remy, I..." Allison started, finally opening her eyes, but not backing very far away. In fact, she was kneeling in front of the brunette with an arm on either side of her lap.

"I shouldn't have-" Remy started.

"I should have-" Allison said at the same time. They both broke off and looked at each other helplessly.

"I think if you want me to actually make any sense, you're going to have to back up a little," Remy said with a hint of a smirk tugging at the corners of her mouth.

Allison put out a hand again and twirled a lock of brunette hair between her fingers. "What if I don't want to make sense?" she whispered, staring right into Remy's eyes. Remy felt all words dry up at that.

And Allison was leaning in again, this time with more than just a small brush of her lips. This time she was determined, her mouth moving against Remy's, and the second woman couldn't help but respond, with her lips and by running a hand through Allison's hair. When she felt Allison's tongue against her lower lip, she tore herself away.

"Remy?" Allison questioned. Remy backed away to a safe distance, pulling her legs up in front of her as a sort of barrier.

"Do you know what you're doing?" Remy asked, half scowling at a pillow, not looking Allison in the eye.

"Um, I may not be the best diagnostician in the world, but I would give that a diagnosis of kissing you?" Allison responded with sarcasm.

"Last time I checked, you were straight," Remy pointed out. Allison laughed at that.

"Last time I checked, I never really labeled myself with a specific sexuality to you, or anyone else at the hospital in fact," Allison countered, the laughter quickly disappearing from her face.

"So you've done this before?" Remy asked in disbelief, raising an eyebrow.

Half of her wanted to just shut up and grab the blonde and kiss her senseless, ask questions later. But she had to know that Allison really wanted this, that she wasn't just tired, cuddly, and missing having a man in her life.

"If by that you mean making a move on someone that I find attractive, then yes, I have," Allison said, a bit of frustration creeping into her voice.

"No, I mean kiss a girl. You said a little while ago when we went out to drinks with the team that you'd never kissed a girl. Am I to assume that between then and now you've gone out, reevaluated your sexuality, and kissed a girl since then?" Remy asked. She knew that it was harsh, probably unnecessary, but she was feeling vulnerable. She really liked Allison, and not in the I-want-to-screw-you-and-leave way she usually felt. She didn't want to be just the object of the older doctor's bi-curiosity.

"If I say yes, does that mean I can kiss you again?" Allison asked hopefully.

Remy actually had to cover her mouth to stop herself from laughing. Here House had called her the one with the uncontrollable libido, but Allison was the one pressing to hard to get back to the physical contact. In fact, Allison's hopefulness was so adorable that Remy almost gave in.

"No. I just… do you know what you're getting into? I'm everything you shouldn't want. I'm dying of Huntington's. I've got a dangerous history of self-destruction. I… I've another woman for God's sake," Remy tried to explain. At that, Allison ran a hand through her own hair and gave the brunette a funny look.

"Did you just give an argument against bisexuality?" Allison said slowly. Remy groaned audibly.

"That's not the point. The point is that I think you're confused. You've never felt this way about a woman before, and you're not prepared to handle it. You're probably just confused," Remy said, trying desperately to get her point across.

"You're right, I haven't ever felt this way about a woman before. But so what? I'm not confused. I see this beautiful and obviously intelligent doctor in front of me who has more compassion than I suspected, more than she likes to let people know, who is chivalrous and hilarious at times. That's what I see," Allison said seriously. "I didn't really stop to notice what gender you were," Allison tried to joke at the end.

Remy didn't even know how to address the first part of what the other woman had said. So she focused on the second part. "But gender is an important part of-"

"Oh, shut up!" Allison interrupted sharply. Remy clamped her mouth shut obediently. "Yes, I've never felt this way about a woman before. How old were you when you had your first girl crush?"

"Fifteen," Remy answered quietly.

"Alright, fifteen. So, before that, you had never liked a girl before. Did that stop you from liking her? Did it make it invalid? Just because I've never done it before doesn't mean I shouldn't," Allison said much more calmly.

Remy took a few deep breaths, processing what Allison was saying. "Okay… but what about everything else I said? All the other reasons why you shouldn't be interested in me?"

"For the second time, would you just shut up?" Allison groaned, rolling her eyes. "And kiss me while you're at it," she added in a playful whisper.

"Yes ma'am," Remy answered with a smile.

* * *

A/N: So... finally! I'm a fan of the slow-ish build-up in the Cadley relationship, but I thought that it was about time. Actually, I had planned for this to happen on the last day of the conference, and it did. Now then, there will most likely only be one or two more chapters of this unless you guys really want me to keep it going, so review and let me know what you think!


	11. Lessons Learned

The next day, Remy woke up still smiling. She stretched and rolled over in her bed to get a view of Allison… in the other bed. No, she had not slept with the other woman, though they had spent some quality time in Allison's bed the night before during the movie. Remy didn't want to rush her. She had never so much as kissed a girl before, so having sex the first day she decides to kiss the woman of her newfound affections would have been a little much. Nevertheless, it was a fantastic night. Remy remembered every detail of it in crystal clear high definition, so glad that she hadn't had anything to drink when the team had eaten dinner.

Remy watched Allison for a few seconds before the blonde's eyes flickered open slowly. "Hey," the brunette whispered.

Allison gave her a sleepy smile. "Morning," she replied. The two women laid there for a moment, each in their respective beds, each having a flashback of the previous night though neither knew what the other was thinking.

"We should probably get up. If we're not ready by the time House wants to leave, he'll never let us hear the end of it," Allison pointed out. She rose from the bed to rifle through her suitcase for some clothes. Remy just watched her. Allison turned around and put a hand on her hip. "What are you doing? Aren't you going to get up?"

"In answer to your first question, I'm relishing the moment. And as for the second, I will, but you're going to use the shower first, so there's no reason for me to expend the energy of getting up yet," Remy replied.

"What moment? It's not like this is anything glamorous," Allison asked.

"I'm relishing that I can check you out profusely without hiding it," Remy answered with a devilish grin.

Allison tossed Remy a glare over her shoulder before gathering everything she needed and heading to the bathroom. "Are you going to be able to control yourself, or do I need to lock the door?" Allison asked playfully.

"Damn, now I _really_ regret not bringing my lock picking set," Remy cursed. Allison rolled her eyes at the immaturity of the other woman before entering the bathroom and locking the door behind her.

While Allison was in the shower, Remy focused on getting her stuff ready as well as packing up some of the things she had allowed to stray around the room, like her hairbrush and a her favorite pair of suspenders. In only another half an hour, the two doctors had gotten ready and were packed up and prepared to leave.

"That's it, right? We're not forgetting anything?" Allison repeated for the third time. Now it was Remy's turn to roll her eyes.

"Of course," she reassured the blonde. "Wait, there is one thing we almost forgot," she added, adopting a serious expression.

"What?" Allison asked, her brow furrowing in that way that Remy found adorable.

"This," Remy said quietly, pulling Allison's hand toward her so the blonde stumbled into the younger woman. Remy put her hands on Allison's hips and kissed her deeply, her tongue teasing the older woman.

"Of course, how could I have forgotten that?" Allison teased gently as she parted from the brunette.

They were both smiling as they took their luggage down the elevator to meet up with the rest of the team.

* * *

The team all met and got in the van they'd been driving around. They first had to drop the van off at the rental place and then from there get on a bus that would take them home.

"Alright, kiddies, let's go," House announced as the bus pulled up to the stop next to the rental place. The team boarded the bus and started putting their luggage securely away when the bus driver spoke.

"You," the bus driver said with anger, pointing at House. Much to his dismay, it was the same bus driver as the last time, the one House had pissed off with his crude sense of humor.

"What? You mean you still haven't gotten over our breakup?" House mocked. The driver turned a little red in the face.

"Back of the bus, or I swear to God I will kick you off this bus," the driver growled. House held up his hands in surrender, heading to the back of the bus. Kutner laughed once he was gone and took the seat across from Remy and Allison. Taub sat next to him, and Foreman and Chase took some pity on House, so they sat in the back with him.

Once the bus started moving, Kutner turned to Remy since both of them had aisle seats. "So… what did you two do last night?" he asked casually. Allison's neck whipped around to look at Kutner, obviously jumping to the conclusion that Kutner was acting like House and accusing them of doing each other.

"We put on the TV and watched the second Harry Potter movie," Remy answered honestly. Kutner, thankfully, seemed to completely miss Allison's reaction. "And you guys?" Remy asked out of politeness.

"We used the Playstation some more. I kicked some ass, and then we went to sleep," Kutner replied.

* * *

After the long trip back to New Jersey, the last thing the doctors wanted to do was go into work, but such was the plan. Apparently Cuddy had them all paged, repeatedly. The seven diagnosticians walked into Cuddy's office, most of them with differing degrees of exhaustion showing on their faces.

"I know none of you want to be here, but I just needed to give you these sheets asking for your reactions to the conference," Cuddy said, holding up a small stack of packets of papers. Each member of House's team took a packet of papers from Cuddy. "That's all, actually. You're allowed to leave now," Cuddy added, much to the relief of the other doctors.

* * *

The next day, Remy was actually excited to go into work. She got in early, unusually so; she was normally the type to get to work right on time, or late if she'd been out particularly late the night before. But today she was anxious to see a certain immunologist. A very hot immunologist that had quite possibly reevaluated her sexuality just for her.

When she got in, she wasn't surprised in the least to see that she had gotten there before all of the boys. House always came in at least twenty minutes late, usually more like an hour or more, and the others got there somewhere between on time and late. She was, however, a little surprised that there was no sign of Allison yet. Allison was the type to get to work before anyone.

Remy took out all of her materials for the day, including the completed survey she'd filled out the night before. It asked questions about the effectiveness of the teambuilding exercises, the abilities of the speakers, the thoroughness of the announcer, the wisdom of the safety conference, and general information like that. It wasn't too hard; it had only taken her maybe a half an hour or less. She tried to answer honestly, but the conference was a sort of a blur to her, only the moments she spent with Allison standing out. So, she rated the conference high for the teambuilding and average for the safety content. After all, it would be unfair to give the safety seminars a negative rating when she hadn't really heard a word of them.

By the time she was situated, she saw Allison opening the door to the diagnostics room. "Oh, Remy, you're in early," Allison commented.

Remy stood up to greet Allison, hesitating on how exactly to do so. She checked the hallways first and then grabbed Allison's hand and dragged her behind a bookcase.

"What are you-" Allison started to question. Remy cut her off with a kiss, causing the older woman's words to turn into mumbled nonsense against the brunette's mouth. Their tongues fought for dominance for a short while before Remy started to back away. Allison followed her, leaning farther forward, making the other woman laugh.

"Allison," she chastised. "We can't just make out in here for hours. We have to make sure we keep an eye out for the boys," she reminded her.

"I know, I know… I'm not ready for them to know yet anyway. Chase will just be an ass, House will be an absolute _nightmare_ and I imagine the rest of them would be thrilled. A little too thrilled, if you ask me," Allison said, running a hand through her hair.

"Hey, that's okay. You know me, I don't really like my coworkers knowing about my personal life anyway," Remy assured her. Allison smiled, and the two of them talked fairly casually for the next fifteen minutes until their male counterparts started trickling in.

Oddly enough, House was only ten minutes late today. "Okay, ducklings, that was a nice vacation we just had, but now it's back to our real jobs," House announced.

"Oh, so we've got a case?" Foreman asked.

"No," House responded. "We are going to bother Cuddy until she agrees that the surveys she handed out were stupid and that we don't have to do them," he corrected the other man.

"Right, our real job is to annoy Cuddy," Chase said sarcastically.

"No, you stupid Aussie, our real jobs are all different. For instance, Foreman is a neurologist, which means that it's his job to give me great advice that I'll never follow. You want another example? Thirteen is an internist, so it's her job to do…" House trailed off. "What do internists do?" he asked no one.

"Pretty much everything," Kutner replied.

"Right, I get it. Thirteen's an internist, so it's her job to do everything. And she's bisexual so she'll do everything, if you know what I mean," House said with an exaggerated wink at Remy.

"House, I'm so proud of you for finally acknowledging that I'm not a lesbian," Remy gave him false congratulations. "But anyway, I'm not in for convincing Cuddy to suspend the survey considering the fact that I've already completed it, like you should have."

"But that wouldn't have been any fun," House whined. "Taub, Foreman, go tell Cuddy that we have more important things to do than paperwork. Chase, go look for an easy case that I can pretend is really hard down in the clinic. Kutner, Thirteen, and Cameron, you go off in separate directions and plan our next step in Operation: Revolt Against Cuddy," House commanded. Remy shrugged and left with her survey in hand, planning on dropping it off with Cuddy rather than plot against her.

Allison caught up with her on her way to the Dean of Medicine's office. "I finished mine too and thought I could drop it off with you. What do you think the odds are of anyone participating in House's scheme?" Allison asked.

"Oh, I don't know, I bet some of them didn't do their surveys yet, but I doubt they'll do much more than ask for an extension," Remy guessed with a shrug.

When they arrived at Cuddy's office, the administrator was just hanging up the phone with a stressed expression on her face. She looked up to see the two women entering her office and gave them a tired smile. "What can I do for you?"

"We're just here to drop off our surveys of the conference," Allison answered, holding out her paperwork. Remy matched her motion, handing Cuddy hers as well. Cuddy took both of the women's paperwork.

"Thank you both. I have a feeling that House will be a little more difficult to convince," Cuddy responded.

"Plan on it. He's already created Operation: Revolt Against Cuddy to avoid doing it. I believe he's assigned Foreman and Taub the first shift of the assault," Remy said dryly. Cuddy shook her head and ran a hand down each side of her face.

"Good to know. If you two aren't busy, the ER could really use some help today. I've got three nurses out sick, and no one to replace them with," Cuddy replied hopefully.

"I don't mind helping out at all," Allison jumped at the offer. Remy nodded in agreement.

"Great. And thanks for the warning about House," Cuddy said.

* * *

Some amount of hours later found Remy and Allison heading to the supply closet to refill the non-latex glove supply for the ER. Upon getting to the supply closet, Remy closed the door behind them, making Allison giggle.

"What, are we going to play seven minutes in heaven?" Allison teased. Remy shook her head with a smile.

"As fun as that sounds, and believe me, it does sound great, I closed the door for a different reason. I wanted to ask you if you would go out to dinner with me tonight," Remy responded.

"Mm, like a date?" Allison asked.

"No, like an interview," Remy deadpanned. "Yes, like a date. That's usually what going to dinner with your…" she trailed off, unsure of what to call Allison. They'd kissed a few times, but they'd never even so much as gone on a date and they'd only even admitted their feelings two days ago.

"Girlfriend. You can call me that," Allison affirmed with a soft smile in place. Remy decided that Allison should smile a lot more at work because it made any room positively glow, even a dingy storage closet.

"Okay. So, I'll pick you up around eight?" Remy suggested.

"Sure," Allison answered, landing a small peck on Remy's lips. "Now let's get these gloves back to the ER before they send someone else to come find them and they interrupt us."

* * *

Right before leaving, Remy got a page from Cuddy. It was unusual to get called to Cuddy's office, especially two days in a row, so she went to her boss's boss's office with a small feeling of dread. Had someone heard her conversation in the supply closet with Allison? Or seen their kiss earlier that morning?

"Ah, Doctor Hadley, good to see you again," Cuddy greeted her. Remy was surprised to see Allison already standing there. She looked to her girlfriend for any hint of what was going on, but the blonde betrayed nothing.

"I wanted to thank you and Doctor Cameron for being the only two to give the conference in Ohio a positive review in the teambuilding section," Cuddy said. The two employees looked at the administrator, speechless. "The others did not appear to take anything away from the conference, and House failed to complete his survey at all, though I have a feeling some of the doctors filled theirs out today during work based on the level of completeness. But you two were the only ones who had anything good to say about any part of the conference."

Remy looked to Allison, who had a sort of twinkle in her eye. She knew her girlfriend had rated the teambuilding part of the conference highly for the same reasons she had.

"Well, maybe Doctor Cameron and I were able to, ah… connect, better than anyone else on the team," Remy said, hiding the smirk she felt growing. She could practically feel Allison's bottled up laughter.

"At any rate, thank you for actually taking the time to learn something with this great opportunity," Cuddy said with a smile.

"I really did learn a lot about myself, and others, while there. I feel like I've changed the way I look at some people on my team for the better," Allison said with a straight face. Remy had to stop herself from snorting at that. The only person Allison had learned to look at in a different way was Remy, because now she looked at her with a hell of a lot more desire to kiss her.

"Alright. I hope what you both have learned in Ohio is applicable here in New Jersey as well," Cuddy said, sounding final. But Remy couldn't help sliding in one more subtextual comment.

"Oh, I think what we've learned will stay with us for a long time, both in and out of the hospital," Remy concluded. And with that, the two women left the Dean's office, both with broad smiles on their faces, both anticipating dinner and everything it would mean for the two of them.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, so I finished this like, a while ago and was going to post it yesterday, but I was unfortunately in the ER. So there it is, and I think that just might be the end. I was originally planning on making it to 15 chapters or so, but I kinda like the note this left on. I have another story in the works, the first chapter's already written (Cadley again, of course) and I will be posting that shortly whether or not I decide to continue this (I'm leaning towards no).**

**Oh, and in case this is the end, I want to thank everyone who's read (especially the ones who reviewed). And thank you to the 21 people who added this story to their favorites and the 44 who added it to their story alert.**

_**So, sorry for the long note, I hope some of you read it so you can give your input on whether or not that was a good place to leave off. Review!**_


	12. Eplilogue

"Thirteen! My office," House announced, already on his way into the said location. Remy caught a look from Allison, but she shrugged, having no more of an idea than her girlfriend did as to what their maniacal boss was up to. House sat down in his chair and Remy stood in front of him, feeling awkward just standing there with her arms crossed. She glanced over at the diagnostics room to see that the team had left to go run tests.

"I assume the weasel was planted in Wilson's pants successfully?" Remy said with an eyebrow raised. She had no idea why else House would have brought her into his office.

"What did you do to Chase?" House ignored her previous words and bluntly asked his own question instead. Remy, flabbergasted, did not know what to say.

"Um, what?" was her intelligent response.

"What… did… you… do… to… the Wombat?" House asked, pausing between each word and staring at her like her brain was processing slowly.

"I didn't do anything to him. Hell, we've barely even talked recently," Remy scoffed. House narrowed his eyes, unconvinced. It was a showdown, each doctor unable to see what the other was getting at. "Why? Does he think our budding friendship has been crushed or something?" Remy said with sarcasm.

"Interesting," House commented, tapping his cane on the ground.

"What's interesting?" Remy asked, running a hand through her hair in frustration.

"You have a newfound hostility towards the Wombat. Is it possible that you've finally realized that his beauty might bring him more attraction from women than yours?" House hypothesized.

Remy rubbed her eyes, regretting not getting quite enough sleep the night before. But, then again, Allison had kept her up all night on the phone while she tried to decide what color to paint her living room. Not that Remy minded; she was thrilled at the excuse to close her eyes and listen to the other woman's voice, even if it was about trivial things like wall painting. After their first date a week ago, Allison had started calling Remy before she went to bed every night, which sometimes led to long conversations.

"Yes, that's it. I called dibs on a woman at the last bar we were at together, and he went and banged her," Remy deadpanned. House contemplated this, maybe adding it to his list of fantasies. The throw down of a pretty boy versus a jealous lesbian.

"Maybe he's upset that you've replaced your friendship with him for one with Cameron," House probed more into the issue. Remy had to take a deep breath to stop herself from laughing. If anything, House had it completely backwards. "Oh, I hit a nerve there."

"Oh, House, I miss the days when you were just trying to get me to steal Cuddy's panties. Now you're trying to overanalyze a friendship that never existed," Remy said with a sigh.

"Ohmigod, you broke up with Chase, didn't you?" House responded in his best valley girl accent.

"No, I stole his ex girlfriend and we had sex on his couch," Remy corrected his assessment, adopting sarcasm, though some of what she was saying was true.

"Cameron? Please. If she didn't decide to bat for the other team after being stuck in a hotel room with you for three days, she'll never go to the other side. I've lost hope in her," House said mournfully.

"If you only called me in here because Chase is pissy, then I'm leaving," Remy announced, turning her back to House. As soon as he could no longer see her face, Remy smirked to herself. If only House knew how close he'd been to the truth in his last statement.

* * *

Remy waited in the locker room for Allison, smiling brightly when she arrived. "You ready to go?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure, but aren't you going to tell me where this mysterious date is going to be?" Allison responded. Remy mimed zipping her lips shut with a wiggle of her eyebrows. Allison laughed and walked out to her girlfriend's car with her. Once they were in the parking lot, she linked arms with the brunette.

Remy opened the passenger side door for Allison and then got in the driver's side. She pulled out of the parking lot and started toward her secret destination. She glanced over at Allison to see that the blonde was practically buzzing with curiosity. It was cute, but she wasn't going to give in and tell her what was going on just yet.

During the car ride, Allison looked out the window frequently to get a sense for where they were going. She wasn't having much luck, but then again, she wasn't great with the area Remy was driving toward. After about a half an hour of driving, Remy pulled over in front of a park. Allison looked at her girlfriend questioningly, but Remy just smiled at in return. It was a different sort of smile, one that Allison hadn't seen often. It wasn't one of her devious ones, or her humorous ones, or even her thinking-something's-cute ones. It was… almost self-conscious.

"Where are we?" Allison asked as she got out of the car along with Remy. Remy took her hand and the two of them started walking through the park.

"It's a park I used to come to as a kid. When I was five and I finally learned how to ride a bike, my dad would sometimes ride with me here. He would always complain that I rode too slow for him," Remy paused, smiling at the memory. Allison returned the smile, taking a quick break from watching her girlfriend's face so she could look at the park. It had a small playground- just four swings and a slide really- and a walking trail that wound through some fully matured trees.

"It's beautiful," Allison murmured. Remy shot her another smile before the two were approached by two young children running up to them. One was a boy, maybe six years old, with a missing front tooth. The other was a blonde girl about the same age with a smattering of freckles.

"Hi, I'm Jeremy, what's your name?" he greeted the two women, staring up at them with big brown eyes.

"I'm Remy and this is Allison," Remy introduced. The little girl just looked up at them and then looked away, giggling.

"Oh, don't mind Melissa. She's just shy. She wasn't shy last week, but this week she is. My mommy said it's just a… a… phase. That's the word she used," Jeremy jabbered.

"Okay, well, hi Melissa," Allison said with a wave in the little girl's direction. She looked up at the fellow blonde before bursting into giggles again and running away. Jeremy chased after her, yelling her name.

The two women started walking again, both laughing a little at the antics of the young children.

"I would come here so often that my dad would joke that I owned it. A lot happened here, even when I wasn't a little kid anymore. I had my first kiss here. Big events seemed to center around this place," Remy continued.

"I'm glad you're sharing this place with me," Allison replied. Remy looked over at her, understanding from the look on her face that Allison was glad that she was letting her into her life, even her past. She hoped that wouldn't change when she got to the rest of her story.

Remy led Allison around the park's walking trail, stopping when she got to an oak tree with many sturdy branches. She hoisted herself up into the tree via one of the lower branches and then lowered her hand to help Allison up as well. The two of them sat there for a while in comfortable silence. Allison watched the two kids playing on the playground and tried to imagine Remy as one of them, playing, learning, and growing up here. Remy was trying to find the right words for what she was about to say.

"It wasn't just my dad that took me here," Remy resumed talking about the park. Allison tore her eyes from the children and focused on the brunette. Remy took a deep breath. "My mom took me here a couple of times. One time, when I was seven… well, she took me here without my dad. She had been really upset lately with her symptoms getting worse. Every night I watched her screaming and cursing at God, her doctors, my dad, and sometimes even at her choice to ever have me," Remy looked down, watching her thumb trace patterns on Allison's knuckles.

"But anyway, my dad pleaded with her to do something with me before she couldn't do anything anymore at all. She finally gave in and took me here. At first she was a nightmare, grumbling about how she just wanted to get back to the house to get more painkillers. But then something happened. I don't really know what it was, but we got here and… she opened up. She looked at me and started laughing, not in a demeaning way, but in a happy way. She picked me up and spun me around once, which I didn't even think she was able to do, and then she smiled at me and put me down. We went home after five more minutes, but it was the last time I remember her smiling at me," Remy finished, a soft smile still present on her face.

"Thank you," Allison whispered. Remy looked up at her and her small smile turned to a large grin. "This place means a lot to you, more than just a place you visited a lot. You showing me this means… that you trust me," Allison said, tucking a rebel strand of brown hair behind Remy's ear.

Remy watched the gesture before leaning in to capture Allison's lips with her own. Allison let out a contented sigh into the kiss and continued it, setting a languid pace. The two had sealed themselves into their own little world in that oak tree, pretending as if Remy's joke of owning the park was real for a moment. Just the two of them there, together, still holding hands, was enough. Their kiss was starting to increase in intensity when there was the scuffle of footsteps from below the tree.

"Remy and Allison, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!" Jeremy shrieked from below. The two women broke apart from their kiss, both grinning from ear to ear.

* * *

A/N: So, this is a short sort of epilogue that I alluded to in the last chapter and on my profile. I wanted to give this some sort of ending, and I hope this was suitable.

I am still writing Cadley, and my next project has already been started- **Don't Look Back**. The first chapter of that has been posted, so I hope you all take a look at it and leave a review to tell me what you think. Thanks again to everyone who read, especially to those who favorited and alerted, and even more so to those who reviewed. Until next time!


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